


Element

by mistr3ssquickly



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Compliant, I'd read the eu books if i weren't so busy churning out fanfiction, It would probably help if I knew eu canon, M/M, Minor other pairings, Not Canon Compliant, Post-Canon, Slow Burn, this was supposed to be a short little story what happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-13
Updated: 2016-02-21
Packaged: 2018-05-19 23:08:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 42,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5983744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mistr3ssquickly/pseuds/mistr3ssquickly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Han teaches Luke to swim. And then everything goes straight to hell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Water

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cara_Loup](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cara_Loup/gifts).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luke meditates like normal men drink or masturbate or gamble: up before dawn, middle of the day, before going to sleep at night, seemingly any time something else isn’t demanding his attention. And like most gamblers, he’s not very good at it. Doesn’t seem deterred at all by his failures.
> 
> On the bright side, he’s not meditating when Han finds him splashing around in the lake near their latest hidden base.
> 
> On the downside, he’s _fucking drowning._

  
_Han_  


The first time he experienced light-speed, Han Solo threw up.

It was only a little, only in his mouth, and he’d only been ten years old at the time, but the memory still brings a burn of embarrassment to the pit of his stomach, makes him roll his eyes when he’s had too much to drink, his inhibitions and defenses low enough to bring back the tide of shame, the memory of his stomach dropping, then rising up, his mouth filling with saliva seconds before a heave overtook him, just as powerful and consuming as the jump of the ship, the smear of stars flowing around him like water.

Fear. Exhilaration. The simple shock of flight, of _freedom._ The deep, visceral knowledge that he was doing that which his physical form was not naturally intended to do. That he was doing it anyway.

His ma had chewed his ear off for it when he came home, some four days later. Grounded him with so much housework and busywork and think-about-what-you-did soul-searching work that he’d not had a chance to slip out of her grasp for a solid week after that. An overreaction, he’d thought at the time, an opinion he’d maintained for decades.

Luke does the whole think-about-what-you-did soul-searching thing without a mother around to make him do it. Tries to, anyway. Part of his Jedi training, he says (and Leia echoes and everyone else seems to acknowledge with some mix of respect and curiosity and bemusement), and Han’s rolled his eyes in answer to it so many times it’s a wonder the muscles behind his eyes haven’t started to stretch out of shape as a result. Luke meditates like normal men drink or masturbate or gamble: up before dawn, middle of the day, before going to sleep at night, seemingly any time something else isn’t demanding his attention. And like most gamblers, he’s not very good at it. Doesn’t seem deterred at all by his failures.

On the bright side, he’s not meditating when Han finds him splashing around in the lake near their latest hidden base.

On the downside, he’s _fucking drowning._

Or doing his best to drown, anyway, flailing hard when Han swims out to save him, fully clothed and struggling against the resistance of the water flowing choppy past his boots and trousers and shirt, his gun-belt heavy with the blaster he hopes to _god_ won’t short out and shoot him in the leg. Luke smacks him across the face, grasping for something solid to grab onto, gets a hard grip on the front of Han’s shirt and tugs, nearly pulls Han under, his animal brain clearly running things. Which would be a problem if Han hadn’t grown up tussling with boys bigger than himself in the harsh waves of the ocean, learning fast how to keep his head above water, to keep the sharp saltwater out of his nose and mouth and lungs. He pulls until Luke’s facing away from him, gets his arms wrapped around Luke’s chest. Hauls him up, high enough to risk a bloodied nose from the back of Luke’s head, high enough for Luke to splutter and cough up water and wheeze for a long, thin second before he starts to breathe, his chest heaving against Han’s grip, fingers digging into Han’s forearms as he gulps at the air.

“You okay, kid?” Han says as he glances over his shoulder to gauge the fastest route back to shore, his feet kicking already, propelling the both of them towards land.

Luke coughs once. “Yeah,” he says, his voice rough and breathless. He coughs again. Struggles weakly against Han’s grip around his chest.

Han tightens his grip. “Cut it out,” he growls. “You’re heavier than you look. Don’t go drownin’ us both.”

“I can --”

“You can’t,” Han says, spluttering a little as water laps between his chest and Luke’s shoulders, splashing in his mouth. It’s silty and bitter, tastes awful. His boots alone have to weigh at least five times what they usually weigh, pulling at him just as badly as Luke’s weight. “And I can, so _hold still.”_

Luke’s answering silence is petulant, for all that Han can’t see his face, his shoulders tight with the strain of holding still, probably with the foreign strain of doing what he’s been told, for once. He’s not quite ragdoll limp as Han drags the both of them back to where it’s shallower, pushes away with a textbook-perfect breaststroke when Han’s boots touch pebbled sand. Darts a half-glance at Han once he’s gotten his footing, looks away just as quickly when Han frowns at him.

“Thanks,” he mumbles.

“What in the hell were you thinking?” Han says, wiping water from his eyes. “Out of all the stunts I’ve seen you pull, kid, I gotta say, this one takes the --”

“I’ve been practicing,” Luke says, shades of the bratty teenager Han first met on Tatooine coming through like the morning sun slotting through the clouds overhead. “I thought I had the hang of it.”

“You don’t,” Han informs him acidly. His clothes are clinging to him, heavy and starting to itch. He pushes his hair back, jerks his head towards the shore. “Come on, get outta the water before anyone sees you,” he says. “I’ll show you how it’s done after I’ve had something to eat. And drink. And I’m not talkin’ kaffin, here.” He frowns at Luke’s complete lack of reaction. “And _you’re_ buying.”

Luke glares at him but does as he’s told, trailing Han slowly through the water until it’s shallow enough for them to move at a normal pace. He offers Han the towel folded next to his clothes and dresses awkwardly, clothes clinging stubbornly to wet skin, while Han does what he can to sop up some of the water from his shirt and trousers. It’s a lost cause, really, ends up doing little more than soak the towel to the point that it’s of no use to Luke when Han starts to hand it back.

“Need to get our story straight, ‘case anybody sees us like this,” Han grumbles, yanking his blaster out of its holster and checking it for signs of damage. It doesn’t go off in his hands, which is nice. “Think they’d buy a failed Jedi training exercise excuse?”

“No,” Luke says, a touch too fast and sharp. His cheeks color a bit, his fair complexion and expressive features hiding nothing, as usual. “We can -- I know a way in that isn’t -- I don’t think anyone’ll see us.” He gestures lamely. “It’s how I’ve been coming out here.”

“The ‘droid outpost,” Han says, his mind clicking over to the comfort of schematics and terrain and outpost layout with the ease of long practice. “Sneaky.” He cuffs Luke across the shoulder. “C’mon, kid. Lead the way.”

\---

He loses Luke almost immediately inside the compound, earns more than a few curious looks on his way back to his bunk, but no one asks him why he’s dressed in soaking wet clothes on a rainless morning, a blessing he refuses to second-guess or think about too hard. He’s in a considerably better mood after he’s changed his clothes and eaten breakfast, their current hideout on Roh'kna allowing for real food at mealtimes, not the hard, flavorless rations they’ve endured in other parts of the galaxy far less accommodating to their form of life. Spends the rest of the morning working with Chewbacca and a Sullustan engineer on a wiring problem on the south end of the complex, the work detailed and tedious enough that he’s genuinely pleased to have it finished when Chewbacca runs a diagnostic and confirms that they’ve fixed the problem. He has a nice disagreement with Leia over a late lunch, flavoring the meal with the smug pleasure of Leia admitting that he’s not _entirely_ wrong in his thinking (“for once, and don’t let it go to your head,” she says, the hint of a smile at the corner of her mouth telling him he’ll likely be able to get away with teasing her about it later, probably). Catches Luke trying to avoid him about an hour before sundown, rolling his eyes at Luke’s insistence that he’s busy.

“Said I’d teach you how to swim, kid,” he says, leaning against the wall close enough to Luke that Luke would have to make a sharp turn to get around him. “Can’t have the last of the Jedi drowning himself when there’s something I could do to prevent it.”

Luke glares at him, no different from the impetuous farm boy Han couldn’t stand, two years earlier. Sensitive as ever to Han’s dismissal of the Force and the Jedi way of life, almost laughably so. “I won’t drown,” he says.

“You’re damn right you won’t,” Han says. “Come on. Got about an hour of daylight left. Swimming’s no fun after dark, not when you’re learning.”

A muscle twitches in Luke’s jaw. A common response, these days: he’s gotten better about not voicing _every_ retort that crosses his mind, though he’s still rubbish at acting like he’s not annoyed or frustrated or embarrassed. Always the negative emotions. Not entirely different from Han’s memory of being Luke’s age, a twenty-something with everything to prove to the entire galaxy, one man, woman, and otherwise at a time, blind to just how little he matters to the vast majority of lifeforms out there.

He _does_ follow Han out into the warm glow of late afternoon swirling into early evening without a word or complaint, though, slips into the calm quiet he has when he’s meditating as he pulls off his boots and tunic, steps out of his trousers. It’s intentional, Han realizes, watching Luke breathe, watching him center himself. Drawing on what he knows, what he can control. The Force, maybe, to Luke’s mind. Inner peace.

Whatever.

The water’s chillier than he remembered it being that morning, though he was wearing considerably more and distinctly distracted by the goal of getting something other than water into Luke’s lungs, brings a prickle of gooseflesh up both legs as he wades in to mid-calf, Luke beside him, doing an impressively bad job of acting like the chill of the water isn’t bothering him. It gets him in faster, though, which annoys Han to no end, Luke’s chest still moving in the steady, controlled rhythm Han is quickly growing to resent, not slowing even a fraction as the water rises higher, up to the point that any normal, anatomically correct human male would hesitate or cringe, at least a _little._ Han cringes when the water reaches that point on him, slows his pace. Takes a deep breath and plunges in headfirst, because hell, nothing good ever comes from drawing out a miserable experience unnecessarily. Gets him the pleasure of watching Luke wince at the water lapping up his belly, higher and faster than he’s expecting, Han would guess, when Han surfaces and rolls onto his back to take in the sight of Luke Skywalker, mostly nude and covered in gooseflesh.

 _So much for Jedi calm and control,_ he thinks, tucking his legs under and swimming lazily closer to Luke. He gets a faceful of water for his troubles, Luke diving under the water without warning, which is just not at _all_ what Han’s heart needs. He drops his legs with a sudden cessation of motion, toes braced against the pebbled bottom of the lake, ready to push off in the direction of Luke’s wake to save the kid _again_ from an untimely watery death, but Luke surfaces after a mere handful of seconds, coming up with a gasp of air, pushing his hair out of his eyes as he turns towards Han, a mischievous smile warming across his mouth.

“I _told_ you I’d figured out the basics,” he says, half-swimming/half-wading over to Han.

“Could’ve fooled me this morning,” Han grumbles.

“There’s a drop-off,” Luke says, gesturing across the gentle ripples of the lake’s surface. “I wasn’t expecting it. Lost my footing.”

He looks suspiciously like he’s lying. Han narrows his eyes at him. “Can’t trust the ground when it’s underwater,” he says when Luke doesn’t cave under scrutiny. “Just like movin’ around in space. The rules are different.”

Luke shrugs and pushes himself up into a neat arc, diving face-first into the water once again. He stretches his arms out, pulls himself forward just under the surface of the water. Comes up for a breath. Goes back under. A perfect copy of something he saw in a book, maybe, Han thinks, watching him. Showing off without realizing he’s only got it half-right. Trying to prove himself.

“Not bad,” he says, when Luke surfaces and looks around, obviously disoriented, unsure of Han’s location, for all that Han hasn’t moved. “Where’d you learn that?”

Another shrug. “Figured it out,” Luke says. Then, when Han raises his eyebrows at him: “Watched some of the wildlife around here. Tried to do what they were doing.”

“You watch any wildlife with legs?” Han drawls.

“Yeah, of course they -- oh.”

He’s quick on the uptake, at least. Han rewards him for it by _not_ openly laughing at him. “You’ll move better if you use your legs,” he says. “Drown less, too.”

“I _told_ you, I --”

“Yeah, yeah.” Han reaches out with both hands. “C’mere. Hold on to my hands, give your legs a try.”

Luke looks from Han’s face to his outstretched hands. Looks absolutely _put-upon_ as he wades over to do as he’s told. His grip’s firm and confident, though, tightening steadily as he kicks off from the bottom of the lake. He tries to use his arms, at first, floundering gracelessly for the first half-dozen kicks, his neck bent at a sharp angle. He gulps a breath and straightens his neck first, dips his face into the water. Straightens his arms, locking his shoulders and elbows. Straightens his legs next, kicking in smaller, steadier motions, until his body’s flat, the motion balancing him.

Perfect, for all of five seconds before he tries to lift his face for a breath and the whole thing falls apart.

Han helps him up, lets go of his hands while Luke coughs. “Not bad,” he says. “Turn your head to the side to breathe. Won’t get water in your mouth that way.”

“I just need to practice,” Luke grouses.

Han snorts. “I said it wasn’t bad,” he says. “First try and all. C’mon, try again.”

He holds out his hands, watches as Luke’s emotions parade themselves across the younger man’s face, just as clear and obvious as a holo-projection. The kid’s a helluva pilot, damn decent with that lightsaber of his, but his pride’s awful, gets in his way like a puppy underfoot, constantly begging for attention; his loathing of failure, of looking foolish or weak or incapable always lurking in the shadows, lapping at him like the lakewater brushing now against his bare skin. He takes Han’s hands without additional encouragement (or goading, more accurately, Han’s patience thin as ever around Luke’s bravado) and kicks off from the lake bottom, gets a good rhythm going faster than the first time, turns his face to breathe, as natural as any Corellian kid ever managed on his first day in the sea. Han holds onto him until Luke stops kicking and lets gravity pull his legs back down, breathing a little harder than normal as he wipes water from his eyes.

“All right, now you’ll --” Han starts, but Luke doesn’t stick around to listen, diving under the water straight away. He’s not graceful about it, the struggle to get his arms and legs to work together painfully obvious as he splashes around, but like everything else Han’s watched him learn over their two years of working and fighting and flying side-by-side, he’s a quick study, always good with connecting mind and body to his surroundings and adapting. He turns his head to breathe, pushes down with his arms to propel himself up, above the surface of the water. Dog-paddles back towards Han with little grace, shades of his old gawky self slipping through when Han’s nod of approval brings a smile to his face.

“Not bad,” Han says, looking away from Luke to squint at the sky. “Should head in, though. Like I said, swimming in the dark isn’t --”

Another splash takes Luke away from him, an intentional dismissal of Han’s attempt to be responsible, for once, and Han dives after him this time, catches up to him without any trouble. By the time he’s dunked and splashed and outswum Luke enough times to be honestly worn out, the sun’s sunk low behind the mountains, the air chill enough that he’s glad return to base, Luke relaxed and happy at his side.

\---

They swim together again the following day, in part because Han’s not interested in the blame he’ll catch as Luke’s swimming teacher if Luke goes out after one lesson and drowns himself, but mostly because he’s bored and the prospect of being in the water is better than any of the other options he has at his disposal. The _Falcon_ is in as good a shape as she can be, resting on a world with little technological advancement available to her. Their little band of rebels is safe, for once, tucked into a cosy little world with nothing to do but collect intel. It’s a much-needed breather for the politically inclined among the Alliance, certainly, but a source of anxious waiting for the fighters themselves, men and women accustomed to battle, to strategy. To letting off steam when the constant thrill of being on edge pays off.

Swimming helps, the rush of the water past his ears, over his skin, cool and constant like the streak of stars out the cockpit of the _Falcon_ as she bursts into lightspeed. The flash of sun, glinting sky crystals off the little peaks and breaks on the water’s surface, churned gently by the breeze, by the movement of his arms, his legs. The weightlessness of it, pulling heavy when he lies on his back and lets his breath buoy him on each inhalation. All at once like and unlike space, foreign enough to feel like an escape from the makeshift floor of the compound beneath his boots, the dim artificial lighting by which he’s grown grudgingly accustomed to seeing his daily life.

Luke seems to enjoy it, as well, maybe in a similar way, for similar reasons. He’s as competitive as always, takes it in stride when Han out-swims him nine times out of ten. Pushes himself after each dunking he gets, obviously trying through sheer stubbornness and determination to gain overnight the kind of experience and speed Han displays in the water, which is reckless and stupid and almost hilarious, brings back memories of Luke’s sloppy, over-excited hug on Yavin 4, reminds Han when he goes back into the compound, back to bureaucracy and the cold, guarded attitude Leia adopts around what counts for decorated brass in their little ragtag army of misfits and dreamers, why he’s kept up with this collection of idealists. Luke tires more easily in the water than Han does, learns quickly how to keep himself afloat on his back when Han nags him to _rest, damnit, you’ll drown yourself otherwise,_ the mouthfuls of water he splutters up on his first try teaching him better than Han ever could how to hold his neck stiff, how to time his breaths with the sweep of his hands, the gentle kick of his feet.

He drifts when he floats. Always out towards the middle of the lake, where it’s deep. Gives Han a sheepish look when Han notices and swims out to him, tapping him on the belly to get his attention. Hardly looks like he’s sorry.

“Don’t get cocky on me, kid,” Han says, treading water when Luke doesn’t swim towards the shallower area right away. “Saved you once out here, don’t really want to be makin’ a habit of it.”

“You won’t,” Luke says. He ducks under the water, swims a single stroke. Rolls underwater so that he’s on his back when he surfaces, a full body-length away from Han, maybe more. “Watch this.”

He draws a deep breath and closes his eyes, floating once again. Only this time, he stops moving his legs, his arms. Breathes out, eyes coming open as he exhales. Focusing either on the distant sky or nothing at all; Han can’t tell. Can’t see anything special about what Luke’s doing, either, until it occurs to him that Luke isn’t moving, at all. Not rising and sinking with the breaths he’s steadily drawing and releasing, not bobbing at all on the gentle chop of the water, his body still, controlled. Unmoving as the water laps at him, restless around him.

Nothing like the body of a drowned man, but close enough to send a chill down Han’s spine. He splashes water at Luke, aiming low enough that it hits Luke’s belly, not his face. Nowhere near his mouth or nose, near the steady motion of Luke’s lips as he breathes.

“Nice trick,” he says when Luke rights himself, treading water like a normal non-aquatic creature.

“The Force,” Luke says. “It’s -- I can feel it, in the water. More clearly than I can on land.” He moves his hands through the water, fingers barely skimming below the surface. Looks up at Han with a twinkle of excitement in his eyes, the same look he most often takes on before doing something stupid or daring (or both). “I could feel it the first day we landed here. Even from far away, up at the base. Like something calling to me from here. In the water.”

Fascination and dismissal have a brief but furious war in Han’s mind. “Huh,” he manages, when neither comes out victorious, his thoughts mostly derailed by the realization that a kid who grew up on Tatooine farming scant moisture out of endless stretches of desert _would_ probably be fascinated by a body of water, even one as relatively calm and small as the lake they’re in. He wonders, briefly, how Luke would react to the crashing waves and heady pull of the tides on Corellia. Frowns when the mental image takes on a life of its own, his imaginary Luke trotting down into the surf, bare skin sunbathed in the warmth of high noon, eagerness blotting out all traces of common sense, the waves grabbing Luke, dragging him under, hiding him far better than the lake’s still waters ever could. “That why you decided to come out here and try drowning yourself, before?” he says, suddenly grumpy, the urge to give Luke a solid dunking for his imaginary counterpart’s recklessness stronger than it should be, really.

Luke glares at him. “I was testing it to see how much of the Force I could draw on when submerged,” he says, speaking slowly as if explaining something to a toddler. A trick he picked up from Leia. It’s cuter when she does it. “It’s stronger, the deeper the water is.”

“And gave up on you once it had you out where you couldn’t touch?” Han says.

“No,” Luke says, brow furrowing. He’d have his arms crossed over his chest if he didn’t need them to keep him afloat, Han would bet substantial credits on it. “I lost focus, realized I couldn’t touch, and panicked. Can’t use the Force unless the mind is calm, so.”

 _So it lured you out where you would be in over your head without it and left you there to sink or swim,_ Han doesn’t say. “Probably better to practice where it’s shallower,” he says.

Luke shakes his head. “I’ve got it, now,” he says.

He doesn’t specify what he’s got, the Force or the mechanics of swimming. Han doesn’t ask. “You’ve got something,” he says. Only it doesn’t come out like a joke like he means for it to. He escapes the confused look Luke gives him by diving headfirst under the water, catching one of Luke’s legs on his way by, his grip strong enough that he’s able to pull Luke under before surfacing, Luke’s outraged indignation enough to clear the air, the fun of being alone in the lake with Luke back again in full force.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanted to write a cute little story about Han teaching Luke to swim. What _happened?_
> 
> All twelve chapters are written. I'll post 'em up probably once a day. Oh, and this story doesn't touch the EU, because I'm 1/4 of a book into the EU and still a _Star Wars_ newb in the _extreme._ So.
> 
> Also: this is all Cara_Loup's fault. Mostly for _[The Healing](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3493124)_ but for all the rest of their amazing stuff, too.


	2. Water

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Water, as it turns out, isn’t at all what Luke expected it to be as a child listening to bedtime stories in the endless dry stretch of desert on Tatooine.

_Luke_

Uncle Owen told the best bedtime stories.

Unlike Aunt Beru, who’d sit on the edge of Luke’s bed and tell him stories while rubbing his back, her voice low and gentle like the glowbulb nightlight in the far corner, Uncle Owen told stories standing, his arms spread wide in grand gestures, his voice filling the room, larger than life as he painted images of worlds far beyond Tatooine, of adventures among the stars, sought by pirates and soldiers and knights and warriors, men and women of valor and strength. Shaking off the weariness of the day, Uncle Owen would stand before Luke and wield the weapons of heroes, defeating countless foes. He would stand brave in the face of danger, of certain death, his eyes fixed on the unseen enemy as he described the warrior’s cunning plan, the inevitable path to escape. And at the end, he would bow his head in humble acceptance of the praise placed around him like a mantle, the hero bowed only in the presence of those he saved.

Luke didn’t fall asleep very well on nights Uncle Owen was in charge of putting him to bed, much to Aunt Beru’s bemused annoyance, her voice warm with laughter as she sent Owen out of Luke’s room, coming over to soothe Luke to sleep with a song or a quiet story, her hands gentle in his hair until sleep claimed him.

Luke’s favorite of Uncle Owen’s stories was of the brave Captain To’lorkin, a Corellian sea captain who fought against the evil invaders, come to overthrow his world and take it as their own. None of Captain To’lorkin’s stories were complete without the brave captain being cast into the sea, swimming through the night-blackened waters to the safety of a piece of driftwood or the rough sands of the shore. None ever ended with Captain To’lorkin’s home world being overrun by evil, either, his struggles and suffering always resulting in victory, in freedom. In the praise of the people placed upon him in the form of a wreath or a kiss, usually given to him by a fair maiden.

The endings didn’t interest Luke nearly so much as the middle bit of the stories, the parts with explosions and battles and the crash of the waves dragging the brave Captain To’lorkin down into depths as heavy as the sands but more insidious, filling his mouth and nose and lungs as he struggled against it, seeking the surface, his love of his homeland driving him against the churn and toss of the sea, the biting salt of waves.

Water, as it turns out, isn’t at all what Luke expected it to be as a child listening to bedtime stories in the endless dry stretch of desert on Tatooine.

It makes his clothes feel like they weigh three times what they did when dry, first off, his stolen Storm Trooper suit tugging at him, chafing his calves and thighs. And it _stinks,_ the smell unlike anything Luke’s ever experienced before, infiltrating the very air he breathes, which is heavier than he’s expecting, tastes like rot when Luke stops breathing through his nose in favor of breathing through his mouth, the smell making him gag. He shouts at Han through the smell, shouts at Threepio. Ends up underwater with some creature’s appendage wrapped around him, more water than he’s ever seen in person before sloshing over him, stinging his eyes and filling his nose and mouth as he struggles, panic taking over.

Han’s there to haul him out, yanking Luke none-too-gently out of the grip of the creature Luke assumes Han killed, leaving him to lean against sharp, twisted metal and catch his breath for half a heartbeat before the compactor starts to close in around them, the water deepening as the room shrinks in on itself.

\---

He can feel the pull from the water, his very first day on Roh'kna.

He saw it, of course, during his descent through the thick clouds, the glassy surface streaked with the lines of mist curling around the edges of his X-wing, the smooth curves of the shore glinting like a gemstone tucked among the rolling hills and time-smoothed peaks of what once might have been mountains. Smelled it, stepping out into the wet air of mid-morning, his flight-suit heavy with it, the rich, bitter scent of water, of plants all around him. So strikingly different from the familiarity of Tatooine, of dust and ozone and sand and heat blowing around him, that Luke stood still in it for a long moment, drawing it into himself, tasting it. Seeking the Force woven throughout, the elusive light somehow brighter in the mist, easier to sense.

“I take it you like it here?” Leia had said, touching him on the arm, her body warm as she pulled him into a loose embrace.

“I do,” he’d said, distracted from the wet green landscape spread out before him by the touch and scent of Leia so near, so familiar and dear to him. Tentatively stepping in to fill the gaping void left in the wake of death, of loss, still too keen to focus on, to address directly. “Never seen anything like it.”

He’d heard Leia swallow, even over the hush of the trees, the low rumble of B-squadron landing not far off. “It reminds me of home,” she’d said, her voice laced with a thick hurt, choked against the morning mist, her body tense as he put his arm around her and returned her embrace for what felt like a very long time.

He thinks about her when he steps into the quiet lapping water of the lake for the first time, the water almost cold against his toes, warmed from his boots. About Han, coming up on them quietly that first morning, a look of concern tugging at his features that Luke is _certain_ he didn’t mean to let either of them see. Wonders, as he wades slowly into the depths of water he’s imagined wrong his entire life, about their homeworlds, Alderaan and Corellia. About the stories they carry with them, tucked into their hearts like his memories of Tatooine, secrets unguarded but unsought.

The water distracts him, calls to him. Moves around his legs, lapping now at his knees like a tangible, inescapable alternative to the whispers he felt, training on the _Falcon_ with old Ben. Something pulls at him, urges him to dive in head-first and breathe in the power under the surface of the water. Calls to him like an instinct, an impulse, and it’s only the cool of the water that stops him, the memory of the toxic water on the _Death Star_ that wraps around his heart and lungs like a shockband, adrenaline warming him as he wades deeper in.

Swimming, as it turns out, is not a natural behavior for humans, Luke’s first attempt to propel himself forward once the water has crept up past his breastbone, almost to his armpits, ending in splashing and spluttering and gracelessness that warms his face in embarrassment, even in the secluded privacy of early morning he chose specifically to give himself the freedom to experiment and fail. He tries a second time and ends up with water in his nose. Tries lying on his back for his third attempt, the cold shadow of water slipping into his ears, hushing the world around him with such a striking finality that he goes fully underwater for the first time without meaning to, breathing hard and tempted to give up when he manages to push himself back up, toes gripping at the pebbled sand beneath them.

Disheartened, he wades back towards the shore, the early morning breeze uncomfortably cool against his skin as the water recedes, revealing him to the air. He dries himself with the towel he brought along and dresses himself, save for his boots. Walks back to the Rebel base with his towel over his shoulders, saving his tunic from the persistent drip of his hair.

The following morning, he tries again, and again the morning after that. He sits by the water and watches the natural inhabitants of Roh'kna take to the water, birds and reptiles and fish and amphibians. Tries, at first, to feel them through the Force, but the very notion of it strikes him as ridiculous, his mind refusing to focus, so he abandons the attempt and just watches, tries to imagine translating the effortless motion he sees in them into the shape and motion of his own body, arms and shoulders and back and hips.

He’s mostly got it by day five, the Force whispering to him, finally, touching him as his body moves through the water when he draws a deep breath and plunges under, arms moving slowly, pushing water out of the way and himself out in the water, as if he’s dreaming. The feeling of it is like nothing he’s ever experienced, the cool of the water, the wetness he can’t feel until he’s on the surface, the air telling him what his skin is feeling, droplets of water tracing ticklish lines as it returns to the surface of the lake. The rush of fear when his face goes under, the water swallowing him with greed, pulling him in and down and pressing him up, testing his rhythm and balance in a way it’s never been tested on land, water slipping away from his every movement without argument, returning back to wrap around him, nothing like the shifting sands of the Dune Sea, sliding with the pull of gravity, easy to shake off his boots once he’d found his footing.

Stop walking and you don’t drown. Fall and there’s still air to breathe.

Which there isn’t in water, Luke discovers on the seventh day, dropping his legs when his arms tire, toes stretching out for the familiar pebbles and sand of the lake bottom, body braced to stand once again. Only the bottom of the lake isn’t where he’s expecting it to be, gravity and lack of motion pulling him down, toes still blindly seeking even as his face slips below the water, his mouth filling instantly with the stuff, ears rushing with the hushed quiet of the lake. He pulls at the surface with his arms, his hands, but the water lets him through, parts for him, and when he tries to breathe in, to pull air into his lungs that he’s learnt will buoy him up, he gets water instead, the wracking spasm of coughing pulling more water into his mouth, his nose, his throat. Drowning him.

Panic suffuses his senses, a blind, white sensation that replaces the glow of the Force and wraps around him, spinning him, lacing his skin with adrenaline, hot against the cold water. He struggles against it, fighting it like it’s a nightmare from which he’ll wake if he can just _move,_ pull himself from it. He needs air, _needs_ it like he’s never needed anything before, but water is all he tastes, burning as it rushes into his nose, aching as it pushes from his mouth into his throat, down into the very core of him.

His hand touches something solid and panic rears up with tripled force, desperation lending strength to tiring muscles. Luke grabs and grasps, fights against the constriction wrapping itself around him until the water breaks around him, the air cold and thin and sweet as he coughs and retches and drags breath into his lungs, his senses overwhelmed with the beauty of it, the gratitude of breathing.

“You okay, kid?” Han says, his voice breathless against the shell of Luke’s ear, and of course it’s Han, it’s always Han pulling him out of the water, the strength of the arm wrapped around him suddenly familiar, known. Luke coughs and blinks around the water dripping in his eyes, the world around him blurry and confusing as adrenaline recedes like a sandstorm blowing itself out, leaving everything in its wake coated in a smooth blanket of silence. Shame follows fast on its heels, Luke’s mind quickly providing him a mental image of what he must look like, clinging to Han like the child he hasn’t been since he left Tatooine, and he struggles, desperate to swim back to shore under his own power, and gets scolded for it, Han’s voice thick enough with worry that Luke obediently stills, allowing the older man to drag him back towards the shore with agonizing slowness, their bodies awkward in the water. He pushes off the minute Han’s grip slackens around him, puts distance between them. Remembers his manners well enough to say _thank you,_ Han’s frown answering him loudly even before Han gets breath to start yelling.

“I’ll show you how it’s done,” Han says once he’s filled Luke’s ear and dismissed each of Luke’s responses with a glare that pulls his features into shadowed lines. “After I’ve had something to eat. And drink. And I’m not talkin’ kaffin, here.” He’s fully clothed and sopping wet, his gun-belt tugging his trousers down at an odd angle, shirt plastered against his chest. Luke’s chest tightens at the thought of Han diving into the lake to save him, heat and embarrassment warring in his belly. He looks away when Han points a finger in his face and adds _and **you’re** buying,_ offers Han the towel he’d brought along to dry himself, the water on his skin catching at his clothes as he pulls them on, the normally soft linen rough and heavy where it sits on him.

He slips away from Han with the ease of practice he developed, slipping away from Uncle Owen’s watchful eye to tinker with his ‘hopper in the gathering cool of early evening before his chores were done for the day, returns to his quarters to escape his wet clothes and dry his hair, settling on his bunk to meditate, moving mechanically through the exercises Ben taught him aboard the _Falcon,_ the memory of water and panic and suffocation putting a significant damper on his success.

Han, of course, manages to find him and corner him at the end of the day, early for Luke to be abandoning his tasks, daylight streaming in through the narrow windows along the corridor, and insists on making good on his offer to show Luke how to swim. He rolls his eyes when Luke tries to make excuses about the work he -- _they_ \-- both should be doing instead, stands close enough that Luke can smell engine grease on him, the acrid remnants of a day spent tinkering with the _Falcon_ instead of helping with prepare for the Alliance’s next move.

“Can’t have the last of the Jedi drowning himself,” Han says, irreverent as always, leaning right into Luke’s personal space. “Not when there’s something I could do to prevent it.”

“I won’t drown,” Luke says on reflex, the embarrassment of nearly doing just that rising in his throat, pulling color into his cheeks along with it.

“You’re damn right you won’t,” Han says, cocky and full of himself as ever. “Come on.”

Luke goes, only because he’s argued with Han before, watched Leia fight with him plenty. Knows a lost cause when he sees one, doesn’t much relish the notion of Han raising his voice or calling on Wedge or Leia for help, telling anyone and everyone that Luke needs swimming lessons because he tried to breathe in the lake earlier that morning and failed spectacularly. The thought of Wedge finding out, or Leia, sends a sick twist through his gut. He steadies himself with a breathing exercise Ben taught him, reaches out blindly for the Force, desperate for the calming warmth he feels in it, sometimes.

Nothing comes.

The water’s cool against his feet, feathering wet kisses up his ankles and calves as he wades in, hyper-aware of Han to his side, watching him. It’s distracting, the way Han stares sometimes. A Corellian habit, Luke suspects, having experienced the same from Wedge, only Wedge thinks he’s a great pilot and a powerful Jedi, treats him like a friend. Han laughs at him and calls him _kid_ and has seen him mess up more times than he’s seen him get things right, saved his skin more in the two years they’ve lived and fought and survived together than any of Uncle Owen’s best bedtime story heroes ever did. Luke turns just in time to see Han dive into the water headfirst, even though he’s only waist-deep, frowns as Han surfaces and laughs at him when the ripples from his dive splash the still-warm skin of Luke’s middle, almost up to his chest.

Competition swells like a fire in Luke’s belly, not unlike the feeling he used to get before smearing Biggs’ latest speed record, hurtling down Beggars’ Canyon at speeds that would’ve made Aunt Beru faint if she’d been there to see him. He pushes his toes against the bottom of the lake and does his best to copy Han’s dive, his lack of grace only serving to help him splash Han in the face, the older man’s scowl when Luke surfaces a sure sign of small victory. He pushes himself through the water, arms keeping him afloat. Gives Han the good-boy smile that always worked on Aunt Beru when he sees Han watching him still.

“I _told_ you I’d figured out the basics,” he says, proudly.

Han snorts, breath making the water ripple. “Not bad,” he says, and Luke can tell from his tone that there’s a catch, something he’s missed. “Where’d you learn that?”

He hesitates, doesn’t feel like telling the truth, not when the truth is just going to get him teased. Feels like the biggest idiot in the system when that’s _exactly_ what happens, only worse because Han doesn’t call him an idiot. Han stretches out his hands instead, offering to help him learn how to move his stupid legs, the feeling only worsening when he gets a mouthful of water for his trouble, Han’s reassurances that he did okay for a first try salt in the wound.

And it doesn’t help that Han is _right,_ the water moving differently when Luke kicks his legs, his abdomen tightening, keeping his hips rigid, rotating behind him. Just like the fish he watched, darting quick as lightning under the surface of the water. His arms don’t want to cooperate with him at first, pulling at the wrong rhythm, but he figures it out fast enough, his body practically gliding through the cool water gone dark with twilight. He pushes himself up when the little mouthfuls of air he’s snatched as he swam aren’t enough, looks around for Han, finds him not far away, treading water and looking impressed.

“Not bad,” Han says.

Luke dives under the water before Han can follow that up with anything else, heart racing as he explores the world of silence he’s discovered, water caressing his skin like a hand, Han a comforting presence nearby, swimming with him until it’s well and truly dark out, the two of them stumbling back to the barracks in the dark together.

\---

That night, he dreams.

He’s back on Tatooine, the sands stretching out before him, cool and blowing in the dying light of the second sun, the stars close enough that he can touch them when he stretches out his hand, rippling their bright surfaces with the barest brush of his fingertips. Uncle Owen calls to him from the glow of the front stoop, tells him to come in, the sound of his voice so painfully welcome that Luke doesn’t hesitate to turn and dive into the sand, the grains parting and melting into the graceful touch of water, his uncle’s hand warm when he bends down to pull Luke up, into the warmth of the day still trapped in the kitchen. Aunt Beru clucks her tongue at him in affectionate reproach as she comes over to dust sand from Luke’s tunic, her eyes warm. Luke lets her fuss over him for a minute before swatting at the rag in her hand, laughing, reaching for her, wanting to hug her, to tell her --

He wakes alone, his heart aching in his chest, and does not go back to sleep.

\---

Han joins him the following morning for a swim, uninvited and smirking like he knows he’s not entirely welcome as he strips down to pants and saunters down to the water’s edge without a word, diving under the water before Luke’s had a chance to get even half of himself into the water. He’s there the next morning, too, and the morning after that, swimming around aimlessly until the sun’s risen above the ridge of mountains, then swimming into Luke’s personal space, strong hands and infuriatingly superior swimming skills allowing him to drag Luke under as they wrestle, Luke only escaping by virtue of his wet skin slipping from Han’s grasp, his smaller form faster as he learns to dive, all the way to the murk of sand as the bottom of the lake, down to Han’s feet, away from Han’s hands. Exhausted, he learns to float on his back, the rush of water in his ears no longer terrifying, the silence calming, powerful.

On the fifth day Han’s joined him, he feels the Force, flowing around him, stronger than it’s ever been; clearer, more real. Almost tangible, like the smear of stars outside the cockpit of the _Falcon,_ the touch of hands against his skin when he dreams. He relaxes his features, the sun’s light bright through his eyelids. Focuses on the Force as it weaves through the air and the water and his body; pulls at it, forming a mental image of a net, resting between his body and the water. Anchored to the air around him, holding him in perfect balance, his senses opening, feeling the world around him, the fish and birds and trees and rocks and Han, the latter a warm, breathing presence drawing closer, concern weighing him, pulling him near.

He opens one eye when he feels Han’s hand on his belly, tapping twice. Can’t hold back the smile that warms across his face when he turns to see the look on Han’s face, open and unshielded with concern.

“Don’t get cocky on me, kid,” Han says by way of greeting, treading water. “Saved you once out here, don’t really want to be makin’ a habit of it.”

“You won’t,” Luke says. “Watch.” He straightens his neck and relaxes once again, reaching greedily for the glow of the Force, reclaiming it as easily as he pulls air into his lungs, the water around him stilling, holding him in perfect balance where the sky touches the surface of the lake. He indulges in it for six long breaths. Pulls himself from it without trouble, eager to see Han’s reaction.

“Neat trick,” Han says, his mouth set in a frown still, confusion plain in his eyes.

“The Force,” Luke explains. 

Han’s frown deepens. “That why you decided to come out here and try drowning yourself, before?” he says after a long moment, as quick as ever to dismiss Luke’s religious beliefs.

Luke tries to explain it to him, dumbing it down as best he can, putting into tangible terms the indescribable experience of feeling the Force, but Han doesn’t get it, avoiding the topic by bringing up Luke’s past mistakes, condescending and dismissive in a way that makes Luke’s temper flash, hot against the cool water surrounding him.

“I’ve _got_ it now,” Luke tells him, irritated.

Han looks at him for a moment. “You’ve got something,” he says, his voice soft, and it’s suddenly intimate in a way it shouldn’t be, lodging itself in the back of Luke’s mind for later consideration, the rest of his attention focused on struggling out of the dunking Han dives under the water to give him, physical exertion and competition pushing all else from his mind.

He retrieves the memory that night, reflects on it, sitting in his bunk meditating, allowing the conflict of conjecture and desire and denial to blossom across his thoughts, loud and brash and pushing away the calm of the Force. He considers each in turn, consciously forbidding himself to avoid the embarrassment they bring with them, coloring each thought with the blush of want, of curiosity. He reaches for the Force, feels it in the tips of his fingers, the pit of his stomach. Keeps it close as he lies down to sleep, clinging to it as nothingness folds over him, dragging him under.

He kisses Han the following evening, tired and happy and riding the rush of matching Han’s speed, for once, almost managing to dunk Han once he’s overtaken him in the deeper part of the lake. He does it on impulse, little more than a quick press of his mouth against Han’s that sparks something akin to panic in his belly, Han’s expression of shock making it worse for the half-heartbeat it takes for Han to close the distance between then and kiss Luke back, a _real_ kiss this time, as foreign and exciting to Luke as the water around them, their legs tangling and bumping as Han pulls the breath from him, lips and teeth and tongue overwhelming Luke’s senses, flooding him as completely and brilliantly as the Force.

They kiss until the strain of staying above water so close to one another proves more difficult to manage than it is pleasant, Han pushing away with a muttered excuse about not wanting Luke to drown again, his voice rough, sending shocks of electric desire flaring down Luke’s spine, blotting out residual annoyance with Han for bringing up the past again. They swim to the shore together in silence, water parting around them, clashing in criss-crossed ripples, a weight against their legs as they wade out to the shore. They share another kiss in the secrecy of the trees, wrapped in the sinking light of evening, and it’s exciting, the newness and intimacy of Han’s mouth and hands and body pressed close, familiar and foreign at the same time, but less electric than the kisses shared in the water, the pull of gravity against Luke’s legs a distraction, the tickle of water trickling down his body drawing his senses away from the touch of Han’s hands against his skin, holding tightly, keeping him close. They separate when a shiver darts through Luke’s body, Han laughing as he dumps one of the towels over Luke’s head and fusses at him to dry off, as if he isn’t prickled with gooseflesh himself, pulling his own towel around his shoulders like a shawl.

They go their separate ways once they reach the perimeter of the barracks, Han’s gaze lingering like a physical presence, just for a heartbeat.

\---

Evacuation orders come down the following morning, early, before Luke has had a chance to do much more than struggle through his meditations, his thoughts scattered like morning light across the lake’s surface. He casts one lingering look at the lake as he takes off in his X-wing, leading the final squadron departing the planet’s surface, the _Falcon_ already in flight, bound for their next secret rendezvous. Luke swallows and turns his attention fully to the display before him, committing the lake and the base to memory as best he can before it’s swallowed in the clouds, the atmosphere pulling at him as he leaves Roh’kna behind.


	3. Ice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Han is in a temper when he takes his favorite of the Tauntauns out into the gathering twilight dimmed unnaturally by the brewing snowstorm, angry with everyone and himself and no one and _Luke_ and the weather and the planet and the Empire and the Alliance and the snow stinging his face, angry with the jerky rhythm of the beast beneath him, carrying him away from what passes for warmth on Hoth, out into a nothingness so vast his mind can’t even truly comprehend it, too vast for him to seriously think he can find one man in it.
> 
> He rides on, anyway.

_Han_

Han thinks back fondly on their short weeks hidden away on the lush green of Roh'kna when Imperial scouts and skirmishes too close for comfort scare their unit across the galaxy, onto the frozen safety of Hoth. He thinks back on sleeping in nothing but a pair of linen pants and a light blanket, on the meals concocted from local flora, the warmth of the sun contrasted with the comfortable cool of the lake. The warmth in Luke’s smile, unguarded and brilliant, shared between them as they swam.

He thinks about the breathless, all-too-brief kiss Luke pressed against his mouth as they tread water together, their second-to-last morning on Roh'kna. About the noise Luke made, high in his throat, when Han recovered from surprise well enough to pull him close and show him how to _really_ kiss, tasting the silt of the lake and all of Luke’s impatient desire, wrapped up in the pulse and caress of the water.

He thinks about it, all of it, often. Too often, perhaps. And usually at the wrong times.

Like when he’s out on patrol, riding a creature that smells worse on a good day than a Wookiee on a rainy day, harsh winds throwing ice crystals as sharp as shattered glass against the scant inches of skin exposed between the bottom of his goggles and the folds of his scarf. When he’s taking a sonic shower, purely out of necessity, not at all for the warmth it doesn’t offer anyway, the comfort of a water-shower a distant memory that makes his skin feel even colder, somehow. When he’s working on the _Falcon_ in silence with Chewbacca, doing his best to predict her weaknesses, stuck on a frozen planet with ice forming on her hull, crackling lifelessly across her seams and joints. When he’s sitting down next to the other soldiers to eat dry rations and drink strong kaffin that tastes horrible but warms him, even if only for a handful of minutes.

It puts him in a foul mood, all of it. The suffocating, brutal closeness of the cold. The constant blinding whiteness of everything everywhere, from the landscape to their base of operations to the clothing everyone around him wears. The lack of pleasure, in company and food and sleep and play.

He’s in a temper when he takes his favorite of the Tauntauns out into the gathering twilight dimmed unnaturally by the brewing snowstorm, angry with everyone and himself and no one and _Luke_ and the weather and the planet and the Empire and the Alliance and the snow stinging his face, angry with the jerky rhythm of the beast beneath him, carrying him away from what passes for warmth on Hoth, out into a nothingness so vast his mind can’t even truly comprehend it, too vast for him to seriously think he can find one man in it.

He rides on, anyway, too proud and stubborn and yeah, maybe a little reckless and stir-crazy to turn around, too gutted at the thought of Luke out in the cold, alone, dy--

No. Freezing. Shivering. Sealing his mouth in a thin line like he does whenever he’s trying not to argue with someone, usually Leia, occasionally Artoo. Pulling his legs up tight to his chest, showing off the flexibility his meditative exercises have given him, the strength he’s developed, going through the drills all soldiers undergo on base every day. Breathing slow and deep, centering himself like he does when he meditates, dressed in his ridiculous light tunic and pants, a comfort he’s carried with him from Tatooine across the stars, despite the chill of his quarters on Hoth.

Han digs his heels into the Tauntaun’s sides, urging her forward faster. Mutters _I know_ when the Tauntaun bleats unhappily at him. Squints into the snow swirling across the gathering darkness. Searching. Hoping.

His hands are aching with the cold when he feels ... _something._ Warmth, almost, for all that it does him no good, doesn’t warm his physical body in the slightest. Like the psychological expectation of warmth he’d feel, glimpsing a distant fire, he thinks. There’s nothing before him but more snow and darkness. No sound but the rush of the wind. He jerks his Tauntaun’s reigns towards the warmth anyway, urges her forward. She’s slowing down, breathing hard, her breaths audible even through the rush of the wind. Han murmurs to her as she trots along, worry and guilt and anger settling around him like a crust of ice, chewing at the edges of his consciousness.

She won’t make it back, his logical mind tells him. Nor will he, not without the speed and warmth of a living mount. Not in the dark, the cold. _What in the hell were you thinking, Solo?_ he chides himself, flexing his fingers around the Tauntaun’s reins, hoping to work some blood into them. _Of all the stunts you’ve pulled --_

Warmth flashes through him again, closer this time. Tinged with what feels like desperation, but not his own. Luke’s, unmistakably, undeniably. Han yanks hard on the Tauntaun’s reins, turns her towards the source of the sensation, leaning forward against the snow-crusted curls of her long neck, squinting into the darkness.

There’s a blur ahead, barely discernable from the rest of the snow. Hope leaps up in Han’s chest like a shot from a blaster, his cold-numbed hand clumsy as he reaches up to pull his goggles off. Snow and ice assault the warm skin around his eyes, but the blur is still there, not a trick of the light or a scratch on the goggles. _Luke,_ he thinks, sliding clumsily from the Tauntaun’s saddle, his legs stiff and uncooperative as he stumbles forward. A spike of joy lances through his chest when he reaches the blur and confirms that he was _right,_ that it is Luke, but it sputters and dies just as quickly as it flared as he squats down to take stock of his friend. Luke is cold and lifeless, half-covered in snow. He’s been injured, blood crusted black against his temple and cheek. Out in the cold too long, exposed to the elements, his lips purple with hypothermia, his face flushed red from the biting wind. Alive, though, when Han touches him, yanking his mitten off to feel the thin, weak pulse at Luke’s throat. Mumbling incoherently when Han moves him, nonsense mostly, mixed with the old man’s name, Luke’s voice high and plaintive. Weak.

“Hang in there, kid,” he growls, his brain kicking into overdrive in the void left where he’d failed to plan what to do once he found Luke, too busy focusing on finding the man, on not considering the very real possibility that he _wouldn’t._ That he and Luke would both die, that it would be his fault. His Tauntaun saves him from the inevitable realization that their prospects of surviving hadn’t done much to improve, just with him finding Luke, and it’s only because of the physical misery of the ice and wind and snow, the fear and worry and helplessness clawing at Han’s heart that he doesn’t feel more than a passing regret for the animal’s death, doesn’t hesitate to drag Luke over to her, something like excitement and gratitude blossoming in him at the prospect of getting Luke warm.

“This is gonna smell,” he tells Luke, the sound of the wind whipping his voice away as soon as it leaves his mouth, “but it’ll get you warm.”

He pulls Luke’s lightsaber from the kid’s belt, keeps his thumb well clear of the button until he’s certain he’s got the right end pointing away from him, into the blackness of nightfall. He’s watched Luke practice with his ‘saber plenty of times, knows there’s no special incantation or amulet needed to bring the glowing blade to life, but he still jumps a little when it ignites at the press of his thumb, the brilliance of it blinding him to everything around them. It’s no different from a metal blade, though, cuts through the flesh and fur of his Tauntaun without difficulty, guts spilling onto the snow in a rush of steam and putrescence that makes Han gag, the sweetness of the cold air washing away the smell actually welcome, for once. He gulps in a mouthful and crouches, pulling out the twists of intestine by the handful, swallows around another wave of nausea as he turns and grabs Luke, his mittens slipping a little as he pulls Luke’s dead weight over to the Tauntaun’s corpse, unwieldy and uncooperative as he stuffs Luke inside. There’s not enough room for all of him, the Tauntaun no bigger than a grown man, a little smaller, perhaps, and full still of bone and muscle and organs Han didn’t clear away, but it’s enough to get Luke’s upper body mostly covered, his hips almost fully inside. Han briefly considers piling the Tauntaun’s intestines over Luke’s legs, but doesn’t, figures they’ve likely gone cold already, that they’ll pose the risk of leaching heat away from Luke as they freeze.

“You’ll be fine with bionics, if your feet freeze off,” he says conversationally, reaching over the mess of Luke and dead Tauntaun to tug at the plasteel emergency shelter he’d kind of watched one of the techs at the compound demonstrate setting up, back when Hoth was new and hope was still alive and well inside him that they’d only be stuck on the miserable block of ice a few weeks. “They’ve made advancements in that sort of thing over the years. Offer ‘em with all kinds of features now, if you can afford it.”

He sets the posts deep in the snow, frowning. Glances at the instructions with a grudging sense of defeat. Figures there’s no one around to see him need them, save for the weather, which is turning abominable enough that he really does _need_ to get this shit straightened out. Preferably before his own face freezes off.

“Which you will, _Commander,”_ he continues, arranging the plating and wiring, then settling down close to Luke, arranging Luke’s legs across his lap where they’ll be as warm as they’re going to get. Presses the button that activates the screen around them, blocking the wind more effectively than he’d expected, warmth seeping out of the heating coils with blessed alacrity. “And if you can’t, then your princess certainly should be able to. Since you’re stuck out here because of her.” He leans back against the Tauntaun’s hind leg, stiffening already with rigor mortis and cold, and tries not to think about the look on Leia’s face as he fought with her, her cheeks flushed with cold and temper, her hands, so small and delicate, always chilled when he touched them, his own always warmer by contrast. “No other reason for a desert farm-boy to be out in this,” he mutters with resentment thick in his throat. “No reason at all.”

Luke doesn’t respond. He’s breathing, though, the motion just barely perceptible in the dark cavern of the Tauntaun’s chest. Han gives his leg a squeeze. Swallows around the emotions that pile up in his throat, threatening to choke him.

He sleeps, eventually. Wakes to blinding daylight and a pungent cocktail of smells strong enough that he’s afraid, upon first waking, that he’s been imprisoned on some backwater planet and left to rot in a mix of death and excrement and putrescence aged to the point of deadliness. The realization that he’s cramped in an emergency shelter with a dead Tauntaun that evacuated its bowels at some point following its death and Luke Skywalker crammed half-inside the corpse, still not moving or responding to Han’s voice or touch doesn’t do much to improve his outlook on life. His stomach’s rolling in protest of the cold, the smell, the position he’s slept in. His failure to eat before rushing out into the storm after the reckless pilot he’s come to like rather a lot of the past few years. The residual worry coming back full-force at the sight of Luke, bloodied and limp and covered in blood, barely breathing.

Rogue Two’s faint, crackling signal on the radio washes through the shelter like warm, sweet air, his repetition of _I’ve found them_ so impossibly wonderful that Han wonders immediately if he’s dreaming, if he’s slipped into a coma and started seeing little more than what he _wishes_ would happen. The sharp cold that smacks across his skin when he lowers the shields of their shelter helps dispel _that_ particular fear in record time, the slimy feel of Luke’s clothes as Han tugs at him, pulls him out onto the blinding white snow bringing back some of the revulsion he’d felt, the night before. He helps the pilot load Luke into the gunner’s seat of the ‘speeder, muttering a mix of reassurances and threats to the kid, spelling out for him briefly but in crystal detail _just how_ unacceptable it would be for Luke to die now, after the night they’ve spent together, the obstacles they’ve overcome. Sets his face carefully in an expression of grumpy stoicism when his own ride arrives, the pilot patiently helping him into the gunner seat of the ‘speeder as if Han couldn’t manage on his own, nevermind that he’s obviously Han’s age, maybe a little older. He’s not subtle about wiping his gloves on the puffy fabric of his uniform after he’s got Han situated, either. Slants a crooked grin at Han before climbing into the pilot’s seat.

“Helluva night you’ve had,” he says.

Han snorts. “You have no idea.”

He puts his clothing -- _all_ of it, his favorite vest included -- into a biohazard disposals bag once they’ve reached base, sends them off to with a droid that doesn’t wrinkle its nose at the smell of him, unlike every other organic creature he’s passed since his return. The sonic shower doesn’t do much to make him feel clean, not like a good hot water-shower would, but he can’t smell blood or guts or shit when he sniffs himself, doesn’t feel anything suspicious on his skin or hair when he runs his hands over himself, so he pulls on fresh clothes and heads down to the med ward, only the barest shreds of his dignity and the lingering exhaustion from the night before keeping him from breaking into a jog.

Luke’s suspended in a bacta tank, motionless save for the movement of the gel surrounding him, stripped nude but for the baggy, awful garment covering his modesty. Breathing only with the assistance of the mask covering his face, a monitor outside the tank showing his heart-rate. Lower than it should be, but steady. Small comfort.

“What happened?” Leia says, softly, moving over to stand beside Han, close enough that he can feel her body-heat, her concern coming off in waves. “His face --”

Han shakes his head. “He was like that when I found him,” he says. “I thought maybe it was from a Wampa, but didn’t see one. Can’t imagine it would’ve left us alone, if there had been one, not with the heat and smell of our little camp to attract its attention.”

Leia nods, clearly putting forth effort to regain the cool exterior of her role as commander, as leader, concealing her obvious concern for Luke. She looks younger, like that. Fragile. Han puts his arm around her, gives her a little squeeze. She lets him get away with it for a minute before shrugging her shoulders, dislodging him. Leaves without another word, her boots crunching against the makeshift floor and she goes.

Han stays. Watches the heart monitor on Luke’s bacta tank with absent-minded interest, his thoughts straying into the comfort of memory, of swimming with Luke under a gentle, warming sun. Of Luke’s strong legs, kicking against Han’s grip each time Han dove under to pull him down. Of Luke’s eyes, bright blue that put the sky to shame, twinkling with pure, untainted happiness as he tread water, as he floated in blissful stillness, babbling happily about the Force, once he discovered that Han wasn’t going to roll his eyes and dismiss him out of hand. About how close it was, the deeper he went into the lake. About how he could _feel_ it, reliably. Almost touch it, out in the water.

It’s not water curling around him now, keeping him afloat and weightless and safe, healing what it can, keeping him motionless for his body to heal what the bacta gel can’t. Isn’t the Force, either.

“Take it easy, kid,” Han mutters when his legs start to ache, the physical need to rest overpowering his desire to stay close, to keep Luke in sight. He turns to go with one last look at Luke’s heart monitor, walks back to the _Falcon_ in a daze.

He’s deep in a mindless sort of sleep when his comlink whistles, Chewbacca’s low growl letting him know that Luke’s ready for release, a steady stream of admonishment following, painting a clear picture of _just_ how much the Wookiee disapproves of Han’s newfound ideas of heroism, of Luke’s characteristic recklessness, and the general stupidity of of small hairless creatures trying to survive on frozen planets. Han listens with half an ear, pulling on his boots and his spare coat with all the coordination of a man who could use a few more hours’ uninterrupted sleep. Makes his way through the cold corridors with irritation gathering behind his eyes, at the pit of his stomach, all the resistance fighters he encounters somehow in his _way,_ taking up too much room, the light in the corridors either too bright or too dim, bringing a dull throb to the base of his skull. The harsh light in Luke’s room doesn’t help a bit, but the weak, lopsided smile Luke gives him when he walks in the room does, makes something very strange happen under Han’s breastbone, almost like the thrill of making the jump to lightspeed, the feeling of weightlessness in the vastness of space.

“How you doin’, kid?” Han says, leaning down to get a closer look at the cuts on Luke’s face, close enough that he can smell the bacta residue on Luke’s skin, sterile and pungent. “You don’t look so bad to me.”

Luke blinks slowly, sleepily. Probably high as the heavens on whatever cocktail the resident sawbones saw fit to pump into him. “Thanks to you,” he says, slow, like he’s tasting each word. His lips have healed well, smoothed from his time in the healing gel. No longer rough and cracked and wind-bitten. Pale pink instead of deep, worrying blue.

Han swallows around the feelings that push at the base of his throat. Offers Luke a tired version of his signature smirk. “That’s _two_ you owe me,” he says, softly, and the way Luke reacts, almost half-laughing in that calm, quiet way of his, gives Han the urge to _touch,_ to run his fingers through Luke’s hair, to lean in and kiss him, slow and gentle. To brush the pad of his thumb over the cuts on Luke’s cheek, sealed up from his time in the bacta tank but still red and angry, a testament to the damage Luke endured, alone in the snow.

He picks a fight with Leia, instead, when she comes in the room and catches him being sentimental with Luke, pulling himself back onto familiar ground with sarcasm and insults. Isn’t entirely thrilled at the look Luke gives him when he tries and fails to lighten the mood with a joke at Leia’s expense, and he’s even less thrilled when his attempt at humor earns him a front-row seat for the kiss Leia bends down to give Luke, radiating spite the whole time. Luke’s unreadable expression afterwards hits like a blast to the chest, has Han in the sort of mood that makes him almost morbidly grateful for the opportunity to go out in the freezing, blinding morning cold and shoot the living hell out of the scout droid, the wash of heat from its (uncalled for but deeply satisfying) detonation almost making him feel good about things until Leia’s voice crackles over his headset, wanting to know what, exactly, he just blew to kingdom come.

“I didn’t hit it _that_ hard,” he grumbles. “Must’ve had a self-destruct.”

He doesn’t need to hear Rieekan’s comment that the Empire’s found them, his voice close enough to Leia’s comlink for Han to hear every word anyway. The sun’s too bright, bringing back the headache he’d been cultivating when he went to check on Luke. He’s tired, not just from the bad night he spent in the freezing cold, his body numbed and aching against the hardpack of snow. Tired of Hoth, of the miserable chill that never seems to truly go away. Of the constant feeling of suffocation, hiding alongside the rest of the Alliance. Of being outmaneuvered and out-gunned at every turn, his usual freedom to get away with little more than his ship, his first mate, and his own backside intact weighed down by the grudging affinity he’s developed for the mismatched group of pilots and engineers and strategists and politicians and soldiers surrounding him. Depending on him, every so often.

There’s no time to dwell on it, though, thankfully, the evacuation well underway by the time he returns to base, Chewbacca’s grumble that the _Falcon_ needs some serious love and attention before she’ll reliably take off adding weight to the dull throb at Han’s temples. He downs a few painkillers before throwing his full attention to the needs of the _Falcon,_ the familiar stench of oil and ozone and metal and coolant at odds with the adrenaline almost palpable in the air around him, swirling in the noise and commotion of soldiers coming to order, facing the grim reality of conflict, once again.

He doesn’t say goodbye when Luke comes to do just that.

His only comfort is that Luke doesn’t say it, either.


	4. Ice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luke touched the snow with his bare hands, his first day on Hoth, drawn to it with the sort of mindless fascination he’s only ever felt for the mechanics of speeders and gliders and starships, before. Knelt just outside the blast doors of the barely finished Echo base, the wind cutting around and through him like a physical assault, and sank his fingers into the packed brightness of the snow, the cold almost burning against his skin, raising a hot red flush on his fingers within seconds, until Leia spotted him and asked him what the _hell_ he was doing, her bemused expression warming into a rueful smile when Luke turned to her, his hand held up like a trophy, and told her he’d never seen anything like snow before. Hadn’t imagined anything _so_ cold could possibly exist.

_Luke_

In the Age of Darkness, the brave Captain To’lorkin sailed the frozen seas of Corellia and battled the fierce Men of Ice, a race of demons born from the Dark Side of the Force for the sole purpose of seeping all warmth from the worlds across the wide galaxy, Tatooine’s hot sands and beautiful suns their ultimate goal. Wrapped in the skins of banthas, sent as a tribute from the wise, grateful elders on Tatooine, the brave captain met the Men of Ice at the frozen Corellian north pole and battled them, the wind whipping like a blade against his face, his hands numb with cold as striking and deadly as the heat of Tatooine at midday.

Luke loved that story, as a child. Begged Uncle Owen to tell it, over and over and over, until he could practically recite it along with his uncle, his imagination painting the bleak landscape in his uncle’s shadow cast against his bedroom wall, heart pounding with excitement as his uncle stepped forward into the killing blow that defeated the frozen heart of the King of the Men of Ice, Captain To’lorkin victorious once again.

\---

Seated astride the shifting back of a Tauntaun, squinting against the glare reflecting off the ice and snow of Hoth, Luke thinks back fondly on the memory of the story, the frigid air carrying glistening crystals of ice in swirls around him, the sky a purer blue than any he’s ever imagined.

If only it weren’t so _unbelievably_ cold.

He touched the snow with his bare hands, his first day on Hoth, drawn to it with the sort of mindless fascination he’s only ever felt for the mechanics of speeders and gliders and starships, before. Knelt just outside the blast doors of the barely finished Echo base, the wind cutting around and through him like a physical assault, and sank his fingers into the packed brightness of the snow, the cold almost burning against his skin, raising a hot red flush on his fingers within seconds, until Leia spotted him and asked him what the _hell_ he was doing, her bemused expression warming into a rueful smile when Luke turned to her, his hand held up like a trophy, and told her he’d never seen anything like snow before. Hadn’t imagined anything _so_ cold could possibly exist.

“Well, at least _someone’s_ enthusiastic,” she’d said, linking her arm with his when he stood and tugged his gloves back on, happy to go back inside, away from the wind insinuating itself in his uniform, despite the thick quilted layers wrapped around his body, stiff and stifling and unfamiliar.

She’d been referring to Han, of course, the older man stalking around the base in a perpetually foul mood within minutes of his arrival in the _Falcon,_ wrapped up in a thick dark coat that stood out amidst the white of the landscape and equipment and everyone else’s uniforms, all specifically designed to camouflage and conceal. He’d spared very few kind words to Luke or Leia, agitated and short-tempered in a way Luke told himself he didn’t take personally, the creeping fear of Imperial notice enough to distract him, the suffocating cold wrapped around the routine of training and planning and scouting keeping him from dwelling too often or too long on the memories of Roh'kna, of warmth and comfort and closeness, both with Han and with the Force.

He strokes his Tauntaun’s neck and surveys the landscape, the Tauntaun’s thick fur matted with snow, textures muted through the layers of his gloves. Reaches out, out of habit or boredom or both, seeking the Force in the glistening cold of mid-day. Faint like the snow brushing against his goggles, he can feel the Force, bright like the sun on new snow, warm like nothing on Hoth seems to be. Fleeting and fickle when Luke’s attention falters, drawn to the explosion of earth and ice as a meteorite crashes to the surface, sending up a plume of rock and dust to dirty the crisp clean air, excitement flaring in Luke’s chest at the sight of it.

“There’s a meteorite, hit the ground near here,” he tells Han over the comlink, once he’s got the snow brushed from his forearm, his humor at Han’s grumpy evaluation of Hoth mixing with the excitement of spotting the meteorite’s touchdown, warming him. “I’m gonna go check it out. Won’t be long.”

That turns out to be a lie.

He thinks of old Ben’s training when he comes to, upside down, suspended quite a ways above an ice-packed ground, blood filling his skull with a throbbing, steady headache, of Ben’s warning that the Force can only be properly sensed when one is calm and focused, not eagerly setting off in pursuit of adventure and excitement. Not that Ben put it that way, but Luke’s pretty sure that’s what he was getting at in the lesson. Being strung up upside down in an ice cavern, cold and disoriented, doesn’t do much for inner peace or calm focus, but Luke does his best, clearing his mind of fear and embarrassment and discomfort, focusing hard on the feel of the Force, forming a clear mental image of his lightsaber -- frustratingly close but just out of reach -- coming to him, filling his gloved hand with its solid weight, its promise of protection.

The good news is: He succeeds, cutting himself free just in time to cut down the wampa his sensors completely failed to detect.

The bad news is: He panics, running from the towering behemoth.

The snow slips beneath his boots, all at once as treacherous as sand but slicker, sending him into a graceless face-first sprawl, snow clinging to his face, burning the exposed skin, filling his mouth with the crisp cold he drank in with relish his first day on the planet. He pushes himself up, disoriented and dizzy. Strikes out towards the gathering dark of night, reaching out in desperation for the Force, begging it to guide him, get him back to the relative warmth of base.

Cold and weariness answer him, the snow burning like the sands of home when he stumbles and doesn’t have the strength to pull himself back up.

\---

He dreams.

Ben crosses the whiteness of sand and snow swirling around the impossibility of his footsteps. He looks down where Luke is lying, his blue eyes just as kindly as they were the day he saved Luke from the Tusken Raiders, his voice gentle as he says Luke’s name.

“You must go to the Dagobah system,” Ben says, his voice thin on the whipping wind, dark like the coming night. “There you will learn from Yoda, the Jedi master who instructed me.”

Luke reaches for him, tries to speak to him, but his tongue feels like ice in his mouth, thick and uncooperative. He blinks and Ben is gone, a dark shape moving towards him instead, and Ben’s voice morphs into Han’s, harsh and grating, tinged with fear so sharp and visceral that Luke can _taste_ it, bitter and flowing on the Force, filling his mouth and nose until he can’t breathe around it, his body sinking into cold and darkness.

\---

He’s drowning when he wakes.

Submerged in bacta gel and stripped nude, he fights against the wires and tubes and electrodes clinging to him like parasites, struggling with what little energy he has until the tank has drained and the medic on duty has told him enough times to be still for the words to penetrate the sterling panic ringing in his head, jangling through him like a physical attack. He tries to speak but the breathing tube in his mouth and throat gags him, keeps him silent. Throws up, bile and dry heaves, when the medi-droid removes the tube, his stomach rolling as he’s cleaned and dried and dressed, his left arm throbbing dully around the port in the crook of his elbow, the pain receding as he’s given a dose of something, all but gone as a human medic removes the port and seals the hole with a bacta patch.

“You’ll be fine,” he says, patting Luke on the knee. “Just need to rest, now.”

Rest sounds good. Threepio sees to it that Luke doesn’t get any, though, his chattering and Artoo’s concerned beeping making him chuckle softly, warmth blossoming in his chest, giving him the urge to climb out of bed and wrap his arms around the little droid bumping gently against the foot of his bed, beeping and trilling at him in earnest. He resists the urge, distracted by Han coming in to see him, Chewbacca behind him like an ever-present hairy shadow. The drugs make his vision a little blurry, but Han leans in close enough for Luke to see him clearly, close enough that Luke half expects him to lean in and press their mouths together, but he doesn’t, his voice soft and gentle, lulling Luke like a song.

His voice sharpens as he talks with Leia, their words tangling in Luke’s mind, nonsensical and confusing and too fast, Leia’s hands none-too-gentle as she stalks across the room and pulls him away from the pillow, her lips warm and soft as she pushes their mouths together in a rushed, angry kiss, different from the kisses he exchanged with Han, full of a feeling Luke can’t quite identify or process, the room spinning around him as she releases him and looks up at Han like she’s challenging him to a fight. In his drug-enhanced state of grace, Luke watches, thinking how _small_ Leia is next to Han’s towering height, how little of a chance she’d have against him in a fight, before his logical brain catches up to remind him that, where Han and Leia verbally spar with irritating frequency, the likelihood that either would ever raise a hand to the other is practically zero. He looks up at Han, half-hoping for one of Han’s soft, probing kisses as Leia leaves the room, but Han leaves as well (without kissing him), spurred by the command of General Rieekan’s voice over the loudspeaker in the corner, leaving Luke alone with his thoughts.

The evacuation of Echo base is well underway before he’s cleared for active duty by the medi-droid monitoring him, his hands clumsy still as he pulls on his flight suit. He takes the long route to his X-wing, passing by the _Falcon._ He finds Chewbacca first, gets the kind of hug that knocks the wind from him and makes him laugh, Chewbacca’s fondness for him always a bit of a surprise and quite a compliment. He spots Han standing astride the main weapons bunker, shouting at a droid, and his heart clenches hard at the base of his throat, dread dragging at him like the weight of the snow, the residual pull of the drugs in his system.

“Be careful,” Han calls down to him.

Luke answers him with a nod. Promises himself it isn’t goodbye.

\---

That, too, turns out to be a lie.

\---

On Dagobah, he trains.

He runs and swims and climbs and spars against imaginary foes. He meditates and concentrates and levitates rocks and branches (and Artoo, when he’s not careful to keep his concentration focused), his mind seeing what his eyes cannot, lidded and blinded from the damp earth and swirling mists and ever-present snakes, his fingertips and ankles tingling in wary anticipation as he sits on the moss-soft ground, memory of more than a few snake-bites wending through his thoughts like a trickle of tepid water. It’s all emotion, Yoda tells him in his strange, jumbled Basic. Feelings to be identified and categorized, pulled out for use only when their use suits his needs, left dormant and untouched by the Force the rest of the time.

Hunger is an emotion, Yoda tells him early in his second week on Dagobah, a response to a physical demand, a desire to be sated. Luke struggles against it, identifies it and moves his mind around it, subverts it, until bile pushes up his throat and into his mouth, burning as he swallows it back down, flooding his senses with revulsion until Yoda says it’s enough and offers him a bowl of something under-seasoned and foul-smelling that Luke can’t gulp down fast enough, his stomach pushing aside the input his brain receives from his tongue in his desperation to fill itself, to calm the rolling nausea pushing at his forced calm.

Pain is an emotion, Yoda tells him on his third week, response to the fear of transient, physical harm to his crude corporeal form. Luke nods, desperate as ever under the shadow of Yoda’s reluctance to train him, wanting to be the good, obedient student, despite the sting of the scrapes on his palms, his knee, his cheekbone, the skin swelling around them, stiffening, reducing his flexibility as he grips the hilt of his lightsaber and moves through his exercises, his left eye swelling almost shut before Yoda directs him to the hut and smears a green paste over his injuries, the cooling herbs in the paste compensating for the smell, making Luke dizzy as he goes back out, determined to finish what he started.

\---

He doesn’t need Yoda to tell him that fear is an emotion, or love, or desperation. Doesn’t need Yoda’s gruff scolding and lectures about responsibility and training and danger, not when the vision sits in his memory, so clear and real and terrible, not when Yoda himself, in all his power and wisdom, cannot promise him that Han and Leia will live. _Help them, you could_ echoes endlessly like a broken poem in Luke’s mind as he preps his X-wing for take-off, dulling all else as effectively as he’s dulled hunger and pain and frustration and irritation and disgust over the weeks he’s spent in the heavy, wet mists of Dagobah. He thinks of Han’s voice coming scratchy across the comlink in his X-wing, saving him in the trench of the _Death Star,_ of Han’s arms wrapped around him, pulling him to safety in the lake on Roh'kna. He thinks of Leia, small and warm against his side, sharing with him her small smiles, her gentle embrace, of Leia’s voice, strong and unwavering as she issues commands, as she argues for strategies that protect Luke and his fellow pilots, as concerned for them as she is for their cause. The thought of them suffering because of him, without him there to save them --

Guilt is an emotion, he tells himself as he leaves, his X-wing climbing steeply, shaking as the atmosphere pulls at it, holding it back. The response to uncertainty, to the fear of fallacy.

He doesn’t give in to it, his heart pounding as he races toward Bespin.


	5. Vapor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carbon freeze, as it turns out, was nothing like Han's 12-year-old self had imagined it would be.

_Han_

The science behind carbon freezing made headlines just shortly after Han’s twelfth birthday, the news of the first organic lifeform being successfully frozen and reanimated at a later date birthing an electric sort of excitement among the kids in Han’s neighborhood. It also birthed horror stories about hibernation sickness, all rooted in fact but embellished in a potent cocktail of time and juvenile imagination. Ghost stories about the spirits of hibernated villains slipping into the souls of the living, taking them over like a captured starship. About pieces of the hibernateds’ souls staying behind in the carbon, whispering to the next victim. Remolding the next victim’s mind to suit unknown, sinister purposes.

Han spun some of the best tales himself, terrifying some of the younger constituents in his motley crew of friends to the point that his mother scolded him for it, smacking him across the ear whenever one of the other mothers came by to complain that he’d scared some gel-spined kid out of a night’s sleep. Han wore her scolding like a medal, the throbbing of his ear like a war-scar. Memorized his better stories and repeated them whenever he had a new kid to terrify, a pretty girl to impress.

Carbon freeze, as it turns out, was nothing like his 12-year-old self had imagined it would be.

It’s dark nothingness that presses at his memory like an insistent hand, groping blindly for something lost for hours that stretch eternity over the timeless frame of six long months. It’s pain that echoes over the minutes, hours, days he’s lost as he pulls air into his lungs, blind and weak and disoriented and nauseated as he tumbles into the dust and darkness and unflinching sandstone. It’s powerlessness seeping into him alongside movement and feeling and some version of life that feels more like death than anything Han’s ever experienced before as he’s grabbed and moved and jostled and thrown, his own legs betraying him as he stumbles forward, imprisoned in his own mind, the sluggish weight of his own body.

He doesn’t cry when Chewbacca pulls him into a rough, furry hug, enough of his senses still intact for him to pull up a gruff veneer over his absolutely devastating _joy_ at being reunited with his Wookiee companion, but he thinks about it, just for a moment. Doesn’t lean away from his friend with any kind of hurry, though, Chewbacca’s rough fur and trilling growls welcome as Han demands information from him, grounding and real and comforting in stark contrast to the words he’s hearing, his brain translating from Wookiee into utter madness without much trouble.

 _Luke, a Jedi knight._ He’d laugh if it were at all funny. If he didn’t know from past experience _just_ how incapable Luke is of doing anything well, save for nearly getting himself killed. He’s doing just that, from what Han can tell, handcuffed and blind and disoriented and struggling hard against the knot of very real fear taking hold in his gut as Threepio translates his death-sentence in crisp, prissy tones. Not at all how Han had imagined facing death, his own _or_ Luke’s.

Relief comes in the staticky swirl of a sandstorm, Leia’s grip on his arm tight enough to bruise, grounding him in the slip of sand under his feet, the whirl of sameness around him, his eyes unfocused and blurry behind the goggles strapped too tightly around the residual throb of his head. He can see well enough take in the kiss Luke presses to Leia’s cheek, cast like a shadow in dullness of the Falcon’s lights, the kid’s expression somehow cold when he looks away from Leia’s retreating back and meets Han’s gaze, eyes squinted a little against the storm whipping around them. No sign of embarrassment or pride on his face, nothing but calm, a steadiness that bothers Han, tickles at the back of his brain.

“Thanks,” he says, awkward in the face of the man he doesn’t recognize, for all that he looks and sounds just like the Luke he used to know, “for coming back for me.”

Luke dips his head in a side-slant nod, a gesture Han recognizes as a common non-verbal greeting among older men on Tatooine, a cold, controlled gesture. Practiced and polished. “Think nothing of it,” Luke says, his tone as even and cool as the nod of his head, his words as foreign on his voice as if he’d spoken them in Wookiee.

Han frowns at him. “I’m thinkin’--” he starts, but Luke’s expression brings him up short. “I’m thinkin’ I owe you one,” he finishes lamely. He reaches for Luke’s hand, craving touch, the realness of physical contact. Squeezes it. Holds on longer than he should, really, letting Luke’s hand slip from his only when Luke turns and walks away without another word and doesn’t turn back.

\---

After Endor, he dreams.

The whipping sand pulling at his face melts seamlessly into the harsh fogs of Bespin, into the clear air of the room where he was taken by the Storm Troopers and subjected to Vader’s version of enhanced interrogations. He breathes in and hears the hollow rasp of Vader’s respirator coming from his own throat; chokes on it, swallows around it with stupid desperation, his lungs filling with carbon vapor as ice swallows him, darkness pulsing around him like the long, awful nights on Hoth. He reaches for Luke’s hand but the pull of Leia’s scant weight against his arm is enough to hold him back, Luke slipping away from him, swallowed whole in the dark mists on the moon of Endor, and when he wakes he’s drenched in sweat, shivering under the blankets. Grasping wildly at the edge of his bunk, the familiar hum of the _Falcon’s_ standby systems surrounding him like a shield, like an embrace.

Chewbacca worries about him, doesn’t flinch the following morning when he won’t stop asking if Han’s all right, pestering him to sit, to rest, to eat something, and Han snaps at him to stop mothering him. There’s a look of despair in the Wookiee’s eyes when Han points a hydrospanner at him, ready to lay into him with a reminder of _just how tough Captain Han Solo is thank you so much,_ Chewbacca’s concern real and raw enough that the words lodge in Han’s throat, coming out as little more than an exasperated sigh.

“I’ll feel better once we’ve got the _Falcon_ fixed up, pal,” he says, tucking the ‘spanner into his belt and squatting down over the tangle of wires he was poring over before. _Not a scratch,_ Lando promised. There’s a technical argument to be made that the _Falcon_ didn’t get _**a**_ scratch on her during Lando’s time as her pilot. More like three dozen scratches and scorch-marks and missing panels and fried wiring. Superficial damage, most of it, especially compared to some of the abuse she’s taken with Han at the helm, but.

It’s easier to grumble about his beloved freighter than to think about how stupidly risky the whole mission was. For himself, for Leia. For Lando. For Luke.

_Luke._

Han swallows around the lump that rises in his throat at the thought of Luke’s expression, lost and hollow and sad in the shifting firelight, several nights before. The barest hint of the embarrassed kid Han once knew visible only for a second when he looked over and caught Luke staring at him, at Leia wrapped in Han’s one-armed embrace, relaxed against Han’s chest. Something like the discomfort on Hoth rising in Luke’s body language when he came upon Han and Leia arguing, barely three hours past sunrise their third morning on Endor’s moon, his silence when Han tried to talk to him afterwards more of a scolding than any words could ever be.

Leia loves him in the heat of battle, in the face of death, but in times of peace, of politics, in times of strategy and waiting and rebuilding, Han suspects with the experiences of years gone by that she’ll have precious little need for his recklessness and thirst for independence. She wants him, certainly, but she wants him to _change,_ to be the war-hero she’s clearly decided he is. The knight in shining armor Luke was supposed to be for her before --

A spark goes off, inches from his hand, sends up a cloud of smoke that makes Han’s eyes burn like they’ve not done since he first came out of carbon freeze. He coughs a curse, waving his hand in front of his face. Waves away Chewbacca ’s concerned rumble with a grunt, pushing himself to his feet. “I’ll work on that later,” he says, climbing down to the soft moss of the forest floor, his back twinging in protest of the time he spent hunched over his ship, lost in thought. “Gonna go check on Luke, see what he’s up to.”

Chewbacca growls at him in response. Han rolls his eyes.

Luke isn’t difficult to find, the stark black of his clothes too solid for the shifting shadows among the trees, his dark blonde hair bright in the afternoon sunlight. Sitting in the same spot Han’s found him occupying the last two days, legs crossed and wrists resting on his knees, deep in meditation, surrounded by whispering evergreens, the scorched smell of battle lingering on the air. He sits motionless, save for the slow, steady rise and fall of his breaths, the restless toss of his hair in the breeze. Eyes closed, but hardly vulnerable, energy moving around him like waves of heat coming off of a stone.

He doesn’t startle when Han settles down next to him in a comfortable sprawl, not quite touching but close enough to be a bother. Cracks open one eye, the barest hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth, speaking volumes in the quiet of the trees of weariness, of patience worn thin.

“Hi, Han.”

“Hey kid. Haven’t seen you in a while. Chewie’s been worried.”

A lie. Luke’s mouth twitches a hinted smile. “I’m all right.”

A lie as well, no more convincing than Han’s own. Han lets it go unquestioned. “Good spot for the Force here?” he says, instead, looking away from the emptiness in Luke’s eyes, the signs of the strain he’s been under, written clear across his face. “You seem to come here a lot to meditate.”

“It’s quiet,” Luke says, after a moment stretched long enough to prickle at Han’s senses.

“Lots’a quiet around here,” Han says. He tips his head back, considers Luke sideways. “Better than the Ewoks’ valley and their idea of what -- or _who_ \-- oughta be on the menu.”

 _That_ gets him a half-smile out of Luke, at least, the warmth of shared memory washing over Han like a breath of morning sun. He pushes himself up, arranges his legs so he’s sitting in a position similar to Luke’s, his greater age and inflexibility painfully obvious next to Luke’s easy bend and stretch. He rests his forearm against his knee, his hands palm-up, falling into perfect position to wrap around Luke’s. Luke looks down at their joined hands. Curls his fingers around Han’s palm with a slow sort of thoughtfulness, like he isn’t entirely sure he wants to, like he maybe doesn’t trust the prosthetic to do what he wants it to do.

“Are you all right?” he says at length, half-looking at Han through the fringe of his hair.

Han isn’t. Hasn’t been for decades. He rubs the pad of his thumb up and down the side of Luke’s index finger, feels the movement of artificial skin over delicate metal joints, just smooth enough to be noticeably different from organic, real skin. “I don’t think any of us are,” he says. “That’s the trouble with being a hero. Why I never wanted to be one.”

It’s the wrong thing to say, Han can tell immediately. Luke sighs through his nose, looks away, across the shifting earthtones, evergreens scratching fretfully against the sky. Doesn’t squint against the brightness, doesn’t blink. “I thought I did,” he says softly, “when I was a boy. I wanted to join the Imperial Academy, pilot a TIE fighter. Be a hero.” He swallows. “Like my father was, before me.”

His voice sounds strangled, fighting to come through. Han squeezes his hand. “Didn’t know your old man was a --”

“He wasn’t,” Luke interrupts, his voice quiet but sharp. He pulls his hand from Han’s grip, positions his forearms so he’s well out of reach, for all that he’s half a breath away. “They told me he was. Ben. Uncle Owen. But they lied.”

Han opens and closes his mouth a few times without any words coming out, or coming to mind. He flexes his hand, watches the shadows play over his fingers, criss-crossing the smudges left over from his work on the _Falcon._ “Look, Luke --” he starts, but Luke cuts him off with a look, his eyes bright, mouth pressed in a thin line.

“I need to go through my exercises,” he says, words clipped and even, controlled. “You should go back, see if Leia needs you.”

He climbs to his feet in one smooth, controlled motion, his pace brisk as he walks away, leaving Han to push himself up, the hard ground and the physical strain of the past few days challenging the motion. Han considers, for a moment, going back to camp. Snorts a mirthless laugh at the thought, kicking idly at a pebble as he waits for Luke to put enough distance between them for him to not notice he’s being followed. Leave it to the kid to ball everything up inside, his I-am-an-impenetrable-Jedi act just making it more painfully obvious that he’s _not_ the unfeeling, controlled stoic he’d love everyone to think he is. Ridiculous. Just as immature and irritating as his bragging and posturing on Tatooine, years before. Moreso, maybe.

He isn’t surprised to find Luke’s clothes draped across a rock maybe twenty paces from the edge of the water when he finds the lake he vaguely remembers seeing on the schematics map Leia pushed into his hands, back when the attack was still nigh, uncertainty thick on everyone’s tongue. Luke himself is a blemish on the smooth surface of the water, floating on his back. Han’s eyes haven’t been nearly as sharp as they were before his time in carbon freeze, but he’d be willing to bet the kid’s got his eyes closed, his body held taut by the Force. Probably drifting out too deep, the Force as unconcerned as ever with Luke’s health and well-being. The chill of the water won’t do his health any favors, either, Han decides, once he’s added his clothes to the pile on the rock and stepped into the barest inch of water lapping at the pebbles at the lake’s edge, his toes, warm from his boots, objecting immediately. He sets his jaw and wades out, focusing on Luke instead of the gooseflesh crawling up his thighs, the clench of his gut as the water rises higher, up where it’s going to be _really_ unpleasant. Dives in when a shiver pulls through him, the shock of full submersion helping to chase away his wistful longing for the warmer air of Roh'kna. The warmer water. Warmer _everything._

“This’s familiar,” he says when he’s swum over to the ripples where Luke’s treading water, looking at him with an unreadable calm, expression kept carefully blank. “Good to see you haven’t forgotten what I taught you.”

Luke opens his mouth. Closes it on a sigh. “I practiced,” he says. “On Dagobah.”

Dagobah. Han’s memory shifts through the systems and planets and moons and stars he’s learnt over the years. Comes up with _swamps, snakes,_ and _undeveloped_ for Dagobah. _I have a promise to keep with an old friend_ comes up half a heartbeat later. Sinks something like jealousy, like irritation in the pit of his stomach.

“Think Leia might’ve mentioned that’s where you went,” he says, and if the casual tone he’s going for sounds strained, well. He figures he can blame it on the exertion of treading water. He waits for Luke to react and is disappointed. “Warmer there than it is here, I bet.”

Luke nods. His gaze is ... _unnerving._ Too steady, too intense. Like he’s reading Han’s thoughts, just as clearly as if they were scrolling across his face like data on a monitor. Han meets him, stare for stare. Takes in the blue of Luke’s eyes, dimmed almost green in the light reflecting off the water. The uneven stretch of skin across Luke’s cheekbones, a permanent reminder of his injuries on Hoth. His lips, thinner than they were when he was younger. Pale in the cold of the lake.

He doesn’t resist when Han closes the distance between them and kisses him. Doesn’t close his eyes. Doesn’t kiss back. “Leia --” he says, when Han takes the hint and puts distance between them.

“Would be better off knockin’ boots with Lando,” Han says, his tone maybe a shade darker than it should be. “Trust me, kid, you don’t want your sister hookin’ up with a guy like me. I’m a scoundrel. Can’t be trusted.”

Luke looks at him strangely. Shakes his head. “I meant she’s coming this way,” he says, “so you probably shouldn’t kiss me again.”

Utterly calm about the whole thing. Han swallows around the jolt of adrenaline that lances through him, tries not to be too obvious about looking back at the shoreline, the dark blur of their clothing contrasted with the light sandstone rock helping him get his bearings. They’re out further than he’d thought they were, further than Luke seemed to be when he first spotted him.

“I don’t see her,” he says, after a minute of scanning the shoreline.

“She doesn’t want to be seen,” Luke says.

Han looks at him sideways. “A guess?” he says. “Or can you tell?”

“I can tell.”

Han squints at the shore some more. Looks at Luke when a splash catches his attention, Luke stretching out on his back once again, floating. He’s paler than Han remembered him being the last time he saw him stripped down to nothing but his unders, and more muscular, none of the babyfat softness left. His belly and torso are wrapped with jagged scars Han _knows_ weren’t there the last time he saw Luke undressed, uneven stripes of red-turning-purple wrapped around him like a tangled web.

“The Emperor,” Luke says, his voice a fog on the surface of the water.

“Huh?” Han says, intelligently.

“On the _Death Star,”_ Luke says, slow and patient. “I met the Emperor. We fought.” He doesn’t turn his head, but his gaze angles to Han. “You were wondering about the marks.”

“You readin’ my mind now or something?” Han says, only half-joking.

Water splashes Luke’s cheeks as he shakes his head. “No. I could tell you were looking.” No hint of self-consciousness in his tone, but he lets his legs drop, pushing himself up to tread water, instead, the movement of the water obscuring the worst of the scars marring his skin. “I could, though. See your thoughts. If I wanted to. _Needed_ to.”

A shiver winds its way around the notches of Han’s spine, his memory echoing with whispers of old ghost stories about the mind-readers and mind-benders coming to brainwash parents in the middle of the night, sending loving mothers and fathers to cut their children down like unwanted grain. “Don’t see why you’d need to,” he says. “I’m an open book. You know that about me.”

“Yes, I do,” Luke says, and the way he says it, immediately and without thought, with complete conviction, makes Han’s chest feel warm. He looks away, towards the shore. His brow’s wrinkled, just a little, when he looks back. “What will you do now, Han? Now that it’s over?”

Han’s first impulse is to remind Luke that they’ve won a battle, not a war. That the Emperor is probably still out there, somewhere, and if he isn’t, Vader most _certainly_ is. Learned that lesson the hard way, back on Yavin 4, then later on Bespin. Guilt holds his tongue, though, the memory just as potent as ever of Luke’s crestfallen look when he left, of Luke’s shout of joy when he returned.

“Dunno,” he says, slowly, hedging his bets. “Military life’s not for me. You know that. And they’re talkin’ about -- well, I mean, they already gave me rank, guess they think now they can make it permanent.”

“That wasn’t --” Luke sighs, his breath rippling the water. “Will you go back to courier work, then? Smuggling?”

He says _smuggling_ like it leaves a bad taste in his mouth. Han slants a grin at him, can’t help it. “It’s what I’m good at,” he says on a shrug.

Luke says: “Would you take me with you?”

He doesn’t say it loudly, but it hooks under Han’s breastbone like a shout, jolts through him like a flashbang. Han feels his eyes go wide, no covering his surprise. “What?” he says.

“On the _Falcon,”_ Luke says, unruffled, treading water as steadily as ever. “Will you take me with you? When you decide to go?”

“Why?” Han hears himself say, his mind still tangled like wires after a fire-fight.

A shadow passes over Luke’s expression, whisper-quick, covered just as fast. Luke lifts his shoulders in an asymmetrical shrug, drops his gaze. Preparing to lie, Han realizes, as certain of it as he is of his own breath.

“Nevermind,” he says, fast, before Luke can give voice to the words he’s opened his mouth to say. “You know the answer’s yes. Chewie’ll be happy to have you where he can keep an eye on you. Good to have a sharp gunner on board, too.” It tastes like a lie in his mouth. He licks his lips, tastes the silt of the lake, fainter than the water on Roh'kna. Sweeter. “You know you’re welcome, Luke. If you’re interested in tagging along.”

Luke nods in answer. “Thanks,” he says. “I -- I appreciate it.”

Han scrambles for something to say, some joke to lift the haze of tension and discomfort swirling around them like a physical thing, but he can’t pick a derail, can’t think straight. “Should get you out of the water,” he says, finally. “Lips’re turning blue.”

“All right.”

They swim back to shore together, Luke’s claims that he practiced swimming on Dagobah coming to evidence as he keeps pace with Han, despite the fatigue of treading water as long as he did, his body moving in a smooth, constant motion, slicing through the water like a blade. His skin’s pricked with gooseflesh when he stands, the water shallow enough for them to wade to dry land, the chill of the early evening breeze sending a shiver through him. He looks like a statue, almost, pale skin shot through with the marks from his struggle against the Emperor, muscles cast into sharp contrast of light and shadow in the dusk settling around them. Unnerving, so much so that Han is absurdly glad for the pull of wet skin against dry clothes, Luke’s struggle to dress himself shaking off some of the otherworldly calm, making him seem human again.

His breath is warm across Han’s cheek when Han leans in and kisses him, his fingertips rough from being submerged so long when he raises his left hand to touch Han’s neck, sliding them back to pull at Han’s hair, keeping him close, taking the kiss long.

 _Human after all,_ Han thinks absently, holding Luke close with the kind of possessiveness he’s oddly certain he’s never felt for anyone or anything other than the _Falcon,_ the slow burn of arousal building at the base of his spine warming him all the way through.

 

 

 

 

Bye-bye canon. Hello m3Q-verse.


	6. Vapor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luke recites his promises and leaves without looking back, Han’s touch lingering on his fingertips, catalogued by the sensors in his false hand and translated into memory as he preps his X-wing for flight, his heart hurting as he turns toward Dagobah, prepared for penance.

_Luke_

Tatooine hasn’t changed in the years he’s been gone, the heat and sand and dry dusty air just as he remembers them, the flat, mineral-rich water heavy in his mouth, the darkness inside each thick-stucco building. He shows Leia and Lando and Chewbacca the safest passage across the Jundland Wastes to old Ben’s house, uses what he learned on Dagobah to conceal the anger and anguish he feels as he crosses the threshold and finds Ben’s things in disarray, scattered and tossed by the uncaring hands of scavengers, memories and sentiment trampled in the pursuit of wealth and gain. He tidies it with a mindless sort of fervor, righting the furniture and sweeping blown sand from the corners of the room, his attention caught as he’s finishing up by an old notebook, its pages bent and faded but legible, a shelf full of similar texts tucked behind a torn tapestry, shadowed at the back of the room.

He leafs through them while Leia and Lando speak in hushed tones behind him, arguing softly about strategies and dangers and possible allies and assets. Slows down and begins to read in earnest when he comes across Obi Wan’s notes on the construction of lightsabers, excitement and shame and regret muddling with countless other emotions, filling his breast until he hears the sound of his own breathing, harsh and elevated and loud in the secluded corner of the room. He forces his feelings down with considerable effort, focusing on the staccato beats of his heart, the thrum of the Force under his skin, bringing both under his control, stifled under a blanket of calm.

The touch of Leia’s hand to his arm startles him, makes him jump. She pulls her hand back as if burned, whispers an apology under her breath.

“Are you all right?” she says, reaching out again when he apologizes for startling her. “We spoke to you, but you didn’t respond.”

Behind her, Lando watches him, unblinking, his arms crossed over his chest in a guarded pose. Behind his gaze, Luke can almost hear his suspicions, his hesitance to trust them. Rooted firmly in his own betrayal, his own sense of self-loathing.

“I found some of Obi-Wan’s writings,” he says, looking back down at Leia, her gentle brown eyes a comfort, easier to look on than Lando’s tortured gaze. “I think I can make a new lightsaber, from these instructions. Probably some other helpful things, too.”

Leia gives his arm a gentle squeeze. “All right,” she says. “As long as you’re okay.”

He isn’t. Hasn’t been since Bespin. “I’m fine,” he says.

Leia stretches up on her tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek, then leaves him alone.

\---

He hears the writings when he sleeps, Obi-Wan’s voice pulling itself from the ink on the pages, hard and angry, laced with disappointment and disapproval. _Do not go,_ it says, winding around Luke’s memories, pulling at the darkness and steam wrapped around Darth Vader, concealing him; at the deadly glow of Vader’s lightsaber, burning red like the anguish streaking up Luke’s shoulder, choking him, the helpless denial he voiced out of the desperate desire to believe his own lies.

 _I am your father_ echoes in his dreams. Tortues him.

Because his father was a navigator, one of the best in the galaxy. An honest man, a merchant with a good head on his shoulders and an unquenchable thirst for adventure. Uncle Owen told him all about it, quiet and mournful, seated on the edge of Luke’s bed one night when Luke wanted to hear a story about someone other than Captain To’lorkin, wanted to know why his surname differed from his foster parents’, why he had an aunt and an uncle instead of a mother and father like the Darklighter boys had. Uncle Owen told him that night about the big ship his father navigated through star-systems and border skirmishes and asteroid fields and solar flares. About his father’s bravery, leaving the safety of Tatooine, the comfort of family, to seek fortune that would provide for Luke, his beloved only son. About the vicious pirates who took his life, but only his, Luke’s father’s bravery serving to provide enough time for his crewmates to alert the other ships in the system of the pirates’ presence and escape to safety, alive and unharmed.

“He loved you so, so much,” Aunt Beru had said, coming into the room to join her husband on the edge of Luke’s bed, her hand rubbing comforting circles on Luke’s back when Luke started to cry, tears soaking through Uncle Owen’s tunic, his little heart broken at the thought of never meeting the brave man he could have called _father._ “And you have much of him in you, Luke. He would be so proud to see how good you’ve grown to be.”

The memory seeps through him, sour with the lies poisoning the potent emotion lingering in his heart, a guarded, treasured piece of his past. All false, a fairytale lie deliberately constructed and shared with him for the purpose of blinding him, debilitating him. Leaving him weak and vulnerable and foolish, helpless before the truth.

He wakes from the tangle of dreams in a cold sweat, his heart pounding with bruising force behind his ribs, choking his breath. Aching and exhausted, he pushes himself into a seated position and strives to clear his mind, but calm doesn’t come, none of the stillness and clarity and peace he seeks. Anger and resentment push against him instead, crowding out the serenity he reaches for until he’s left with nothing but frustration, his body tired and his mind racing, sleeplessness measuring the long hours before dawn.

When the time comes to strike, he isn’t ready. Hatred sits like a knot in his heart, a thrill burning up his throat as he stands beside Han’s shaking, weak, blessedly real form and openly threatens Jabba, the heat of the mid-day suns burning through the dark fabric of his outfit, his skin hot as he fights Jabba’s guards, sending them to the suffering death promised him and his friends not an hour before. The pleasure of it twists like a drug through him as he cuts down his opponents, culminating in a satisfying rush as Jabba’s barge explodes, the heat from the flames rushing across the sands to burn at him, vicious and real.

He pulls his feelings in as they walk through the blowing sand of a mild storm, Han and Leia a comforting blur ahead of him, moving hesitantly through the shifting sand, untrusting of each step. Locks each emotion away behind the growing dread he feels in his center, the knowledge of the Dark Side he’s touched and tasted and relished, for the sake of his friends, his feelings for them. He kisses Leia on the cheek, sheltered from the worst of the storm by the bulk of the _Falcon,_ her patchwork hull as achingly familiar as the softness of Leia’s cheek. He wraps his prosthetic hand around Han’s when Han leans in and thanks him for the rescue, the ache of loneliness and desire and affection rising in him, tainted and filthy and rotten in the warmth of Han’s tone, the grip of his hand.

Luke recites his promises and leaves without looking back, Han’s touch lingering on his fingertips, catalogued by the sensors in his false hand and translated into memory as he preps his X-wing for flight, his heart hurting as he turns toward Dagobah, prepared for penance.

\---

Penance comes later, wraps itself around him in lightning and agony in the darkness of solitude, marks his skin and soul alike with jagged lines that ache and burn. Penance comes in death and betrayal, in love and loss, lying heavy in his arms.

Penance comes in loneliness enfolding him as he returns to nothing in the silent shadows of Endor’s moon, the Force gone dark in the shifting firelight of someone else’s victory, of his father’s death.

\---

Han’s touch is foreign to him, afterwards, in the quiet stillness that follows the rush of battle, the terror of sacrifice and loss and empty reunion tinged with lies and secrets and suspicions evident in Leia’s dark eyes, the downturn of her mouth. He wraps his hand around Han’s fingers on reflex, out of habit, maybe, the sensors registering warmth, the rough edge of callouses giving way to softer connective tissue, tendons pulling at bone, squeezing Luke’s hand in a mimicry of comfort.

He looks down at their joined hands, looks Han in the eyes. Sees shadows of the loss he’s seen in Leia’s gaze, pain carefully tucked away, out of sight.

“Are you all right?” he says: another reflex, the honest answer more than he could possibly accept to such a bold question.

“Don’t think any of us are,” Han says on a snort, dodging the question with the ease of long practice. “That’s the trouble with being a hero. Why I never wanted to be one.”

He slants a lopsided grin at Luke as he says it, the old careless smuggler peeking out, just enough to make Luke’s heart hurt, the ache pushing him to look away, across the pines stretching up to scratch at a damaged, littered sky, the edge of the clearing blackened where he bid farewell to the monster lurking at the corner of his nightmares, the father he barely knew, burned in secret on a moon countless soldiers had died trying to protect. “I thought I did,” he says, his voice carrying words he’s barely thought, “when I was a boy. I wanted to join the Imperial Academy, pilot a TIE fighter. Be a hero like my father was, before me.”

He feels pressure around his hand, Han squeezing it. “Didn’t know your old man was a --”

“He wasn’t.”

Brittle stillness fills the space between them as he pulls his hand out of Han’s grasp, his senses filled with Han’s questions and misgivings and restraint, curiosity held tight behind a clever tongue, contradicting half-formed thoughts firing loud enough that Luke can hear it, like the rush of sand against a wall. “You should go back,” he says, before he can pick out anything too coherent, fear squeezing like an ever-present vice around his heart. “See if Leia needs you.”

Han doesn’t answer him. Luke walks away, breathing control like the damp air around him, heavy with the smell of old wood burning, rich with the scent of rot and plants.

His body carries him to the edge of a nearby lake, the Force as powerful as ever around water, calling to him, urging him in. The air is cool against his chest when he pulls off his tunic, his nipples firming instantly, gooseflesh prickling lower as he steps out of his trousers, the pebbles and sand coarse under his feet, but the water is bearable, cooler and cleaner than the muck-darkened swamps of Dagobah. Quieter, long stretches of water fanning out before him as he wades in, with only scant fish to disturb as the water ripples around him, no snakes or predatory waterfowl touching at his conscious, cautious and curious.

He draws a breath and dives, pushes himself through the heavy silence, eyes closed and senses thrown wide open, drinking in the Force reaching for him, calling him deeper, feeling the bands of temperature changing around him as he pulls himself through the thick water, cradled in the comforting limbo between the air and the land, his lungs tight with punishing restraint until he angles himself up, filling them, the air sweet against his tongue. Hidden away from all but the sky above him, he rolls onto his back and pushes himself without goal or thought, the brush of the water steady and even around him, flowing like his thoughts.

It’s bare minutes or long hours -- impossible to tell -- before a splash distracts him, Han’s presence familiar and known, even before Luke’s pushed himself up to tread water, watching the ripples fan across the calm surface of the lake as Han swims out to join him. Weary annoyance tries to touch his mind but he pushes it aside, schooling his expression into a mockery of the calm he strives to feel inside.

“This’s familiar,” Han says, by way of greeting, swimming on his side until they’re close, the ripples of water around them clashing and cancelling each other out. “Good to see you haven’t forgotten what I taught you.”

Luke reaches for him through the Force, curiosity overwhelming the sense of wrongness he feels when trying to read those around him. There’s warmth in Han’s memory, flashes of green and blue and tan: Roh'kna, Luke’s laughter breathless against the splash of water, wet skin slipping past Han’s hands; secrets and thrills, arousal not entirely sexual in nature thrumming just under the surface of Han’s skin. He indulges in it too long, his silence arousing Han’s suspicions. Doesn’t have to defend himself to questions, though, Han moving towards him and touching him, cupping his face before leaning in to kiss him, his lips cool and wet from the water, their touch igniting a deep, jealous _want_ in Luke’s belly. He swallows around it, pushes aside emotion and impulse to seek the core of it.

A flicker of anger seeps into the sensation, giving him pause. A memory, fleeting, of a similar kiss. A touch.

 _Leia,_ he realizes, his heart sinking, cold in his chest.

“Would be better of knockin’ boots with Lando,” Han says, and Luke is slow to realize that he’s spoken his sister’s name aloud. “Trust me, kid, you don’t want your sister hookin’ up with a guy like me. I’m a scoundrel. Can’t be trusted.” He says it with complete conviction, poorly concealed under a thin armor of humor. There are more memories, images flitting in snatches like the light glinting off the peaks and ripples in the water around them. Private moments in which Luke is an intruder, curiosity and shame struggling within him.

He shakes his head. “I meant she’s coming this way,” he says, his sister’s presence bright like the sun, as easy for him to sense and follow as ever, moreso than anyone else he’s ever known, “so you probably shouldn’t kiss me again.”

Han jerks towards the shore, his panic almost comical as he squints at the rocks and trees surrounding them, skimming for Leia. He won’t find her, but Luke lets him try anyway, taking Han’s momentary distraction as the chance to center himself, to pull on the Force in the water, its depth and breadth helping to put his existence into perspective, a faint spark of light in the vastness of space and time around them.

“I don’t see her,” Han says, squinting still.

Luke draws a deep breath, the wet chill of the air over the water sweeping down his nose and throat, clear and cleansing. “She doesn’t want to be seen.”

“A guess?” Han says. “Or can you tell?”

“I can tell.”

Questions rise in Han’s mind, irreverent and not worth answering or dismissing. Luke closes his eyes and leans back into the water instead. His skin has cooled in the air, the contrast with the chill of the water birthing the illusion of warmth. He floats, moving his left hand through the water just to feel its motion, curling around his fingers, rushing against his palm. Soothing like the hum of the regulator in his childhood bedroom or the jostle of his X-wing as he descends into breathable atmosphere. Han stays close by, and Luke can feel his gaze, direct and unashamed as ever. Doesn’t need to reach out to know guess what he’s thinking, what’s caught his attention.

“The Emperor,” he says, the water muffling the sound of his own voice, blurring it. “On the _Death Star._ We fought.” He turns his head, has to close his left eye to keep water from stinging at it. “You were wondering about the marks.”

Han doesn’t cover his surprise very well, a compliment Luke takes to heart, storing it away like a sentimental token, a purposeless knick-knack. “You readin’ my mind or something?” he says.

“No. I could tell you were looking.” Luke pushes himself up, water flowing from his hair down his ears, his neck, cold like raindrops against his shoulders as he treads water. “I could, though. See your thoughts. If I wanted to. _Needed_ to.”

He gets a predictable response from Han, fear and superstition rising up brash and colorful over more secretive self-defense, old shame and past indulgence creeping along Han’s subconscious, tempting Luke to push at them, to lift them and reveal them. Leia flits through his mind again, wrapped in nothing but Han’s touch, desperate and willing. Lando, younger than the man Luke knew from Tatooine just bare months earlier, whispering kisses across the shell of Han’s ear, breathing laughter hot with liquor into a kiss.

“What will you do now, Han?” he hears himself say, impulse overriding control, loneliness echoing in his own heart, all at once the same and different from Han’s. “Now that it’s over?”

“Dunno,” Han says on a shrug. “Military life’s not for me. You know that. And they’re talkin’ about -- well, I mean, they already gave me rank, guess they think now they can make it permanent.”

“That wasn’t --” Luke starts, but he cuts himself off, consciously angling his thoughts away from his curiosity about Han’s love-life, towards Han’s line of thinking. “Will you go back to courier work?” he says, the word at odds with the image that rises in his mind, memory of the Han Solo he first met on Tatooine, lawless and swaggering and smug. The word sticks, easy on his tongue. “Smuggling?”

Han grins at him. “It’s what I’m good at.”

“Would you take me with you?” The words come before the thought fully forms, the eagerness Luke remembers feeling in Mos Eisley rushing like impulse, the desire for freedom and escape and adventure filling him like blood. “On the _Falcon._ Will you take me with you when you decide to go?”

The answer is _yes,_ he can hear it, even as Han says _why,_ heartbeats coming faster, closer together, his own or Han’s he wouldn’t trust himself to say for sure. Han waves it away, water splashing around his wrist, saving Luke the trouble of covering impulse with a thought-out lie.

“You know the answer’s yes,” Han says, graceless and wrong-footed in a way Luke’s never seen him before. It looks good on him. “You know you’re welcome, if you’re interested in tagging along.”

“Thank you,” Luke says, grateful for more than just the offer, the escape, in a way that words can’t encompass.

He swims back to shore with Han, grasping at the shreds of the Force he can’t quite touch through the thickness of anticipation and excitement, Han’s breath warm against his mouth as they kiss, half-dressed on the shore, wrapped in the long shadows of coming night. Lust pulls at him, hot under his skin, lust for the man kissing him, for the lurid promise of freedom surrounding him like a haze. He presses close to Han, swallowing Han’s noise of pleasure as they kiss. Breathes deep when Han moves his kisses lower, biting at his throat.

“We should go tonight,” he murmurs, grasping at Han’s sides, water seeping through his shirt, warmed from Han’s body heat. “If you can. If you’re ready.”

Han shivers, from excitement or chill Luke doesn’t try to know. “Should be able to, yeah,” he says. “The _Falcon_ was in good enough shape, last I saw her, and Chewie was workin’ on her so she should be all right to fly.” He swallows, his brow furrowing into a shallow frown. “You in a rush to go?”

Luke shakes his head, the eagerness he’d indulged just moments before ebbing and receding like a tide. “No. But neither am I in a rush to stay.”

“Got a point there,” Han says. Memory flickers, potent enough that for just a second Luke thinks Leia is nearby after all, listening, seeing. Hurting. “Should probably have an excuse ready, though, ‘case we get caught.”

“You need an extra set of hands on board the _Falcon_ for repairs,” Luke answers, the story coming as easily as memory, false though it is. “It’s not unheard-of for me to remain on board with you into the evening. If you’re talking to Lando, complain about bad parts at a high price. With Leia, tell her the _Falcon_ is showing her age.”

“You think that’ll work, huh?”

“I do.”

“Yeah, I do too, which is what worries me.”

Laughter surprises Luke, bubbling in his throat. He pulls his outer coat on over his tunic, belts it in place, his lightsaber heavy against his hip, his garments clinging to him, damp with the lake’s water. “We’ll be all right,” he says, a promise as much to himself as it is to Han.

“‘Course we will,” Han says. “When aren’t we.”

Luke doesn’t bother to answer, senses prickling as he walks away from the pull of the water behind them.

 

 

 

 

Notes:  
If you haven't already, you should familiarize yourself with [the deleted scene](http://gayhansolo.tumblr.com/post/138649944574/gayhansolo-heres-the-gay-deleted-scene-from) from Ep V where Luke splits from the group to return to Dagobah. I'm referencing it here instead of the scene they kept. I think it better-illustrates Luke’s transformation from brash pilot to Jedi-bottling-everything-up, setting him up far better for the explosive finale on the second _Death Star._


	7. Air

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Jus’ stay,” Han slurs, tired and uncoordinated when Luke slips from his loose embrace, the air cool where his skin’s sweaty from contact with Luke’s. “Jus’ for tonight.”
> 
> Luke pulls on his pants, his tunic draped over his forearm. “Tomorrow, maybe,” he says against Han’s lips, whispering a kiss against them before leaving Han to doze in the quiet of his bunk.

_Han_

They leave that night.

It’s Luke’s suggestion, murmured softly as they walk back towards the Rebel base. Transformed from ridiculous to logical by Luke’s arguments, each laid out with strategic patience, as if he’s anticipating Han’s concerns. Put into action after they’ve gone their separate ways to bathe and eat and act as if nothing is awry, mingling among the others as they always have, Han trading insults with Lando in the warmth of a roaring fire, Luke speaking softly to his sister before settling just apart from the group, watching, listening.

It’s strange that no one notices. Feels like betrayal. Worse than.

“You’re sure about this?” Han says when Luke joins him hours later in the cockpit of the _Falcon,_ settling into the flight chair behind him.

“Yes,” Luke says. “If you are.” He looks at Chewbacca. “Both of you.”

Chewbacca rumbles an accord without turning, busy prepping the _Falcon_ for take-off. Han snorts.

“Exactly,” he says. He glances at Luke over his shoulder. “We’ve had enough.”

It’s hard to tell with Luke seated behind him, but Luke seems to relax, at least a little. He’s quiet through the launch, quiet as Han guides the _Falcon_ through the wreckage of the _Death Star_ and preps for the jump to lightspeed. He doesn’t ask where they’re going. He doesn’t ask what they plan to do.

Guilt seeps in a little when Han realizes he’s glad for it, doesn’t miss the questions, the chatter. It worries him, but --

Luke shares his bunk with him that night, long enough for Han to chase away the doubts and misgivings and worry coating his subconscious like a sludge, the heat and passion and urgency of Luke’s body moving under him, the bright, singular thrill of Luke’s orgasm rushing against the palm of his hand burning away thoughts of anything but the answering touch of Luke’s hand and mouth, Luke’s panting breath washing over him as Han arches and comes, groaning loudly in the quiet closeness of his quarters. Not the best sex he’s ever had, but good all the same. Flavored by the rush of doing what he _knows_ he’s not supposed to be doing. Stealing touch and pleasure and carnal thrill where he shouldn’t, where he’s not allowed.

“Jus’ stay,” he slurs, tired and uncoordinated when Luke slips from his loose embrace, the air cool where his skin’s sweaty from contact with Luke’s. “Jus’ for tonight.”

Luke pulls on his pants, his tunic draped over his forearm. “Tomorrow, maybe,” he says against Han’s lips, whispering a kiss against them before leaving Han to doze in the quiet of his bunk.

The following day brings their first stop and their first job, Luke hanging back on the _Falcon,_ tending to her remaining damage from the last battle while Han and Chewbacca feel out their contact and set about making a few strategic purchases. The next day brings their first delivery, uneventful and unremarkable, the pay coming in on the lower end of decent, hardly worth the time they committed to it, but Luke celebrates with Han anyway, showing off his strength and balance as he slides into Han’s lap with grace and control despite the drinks Han poured for him, his low moan of wanting enough to make Han’s head spin, hands shaking as he reaches up to push Luke’s tunic aside, desperate to feel warmth and skin.

A month passes. Two. Luke leaves the _Falcon_ to join Han and Chewbacca for their meetings with contacts, dealers, middlemen. He’s observant, quiet as he works with them. Lends a quiet control to their operation, a slinking deviousness that makes them all very wealthy very quickly and makes Han increasingly nervous, his skin crawling with it when they return to the _Falcon_ after a particularly lucrative day and Luke pulls him away from the door to his quarters, into the darkness of Luke’s bunk, instead. Something is _off_ about Luke, about business when Luke’s around, but Luke has his mouth pressed against Han’s in a messy, demanding kiss before Han can find the words to ask him about it, strong hands tugging at Han’s belt and trousers with a barely restrained sort of urgency. Han sucks in a sharp breath when Luke drops to his knees to mouth at his swelling erection, his right hand cupping the back of Han’s thigh, holding him steady. Combs his fingers into Luke’s hair, letting his eyes close as Luke licks him, pulls him in on the barest suction. Luke’s gotten better at this over the months he’s been doing it, gotten bolder. Does it like he's developed a taste for it, wants to do it as badly as Han wants him to, moaning softly around Han’s length as he moves him deeper, swallowing.

He curves his fingers around the back of Han’s thigh as he works, his hand sliding steadily higher, moving along the curve of Han’s buttocks to rest closer in, intimately close, his touch filling Han’s thoughts with images of other lovers who touched him like that, lovers who opened him and filled him and brought him off in ways he’s not yet gotten around to asking Luke to consider, to try. Luke pulls away and cocks his head at Han when Han shudders against him, eyes fever-bright in the dim light of his room, his lips parted in an enigmatic almost-smile.

“I can do more,” he says, licking his lips, “if you want.” He tightens his grip, just enough to pull at tender, sensitive skin. A tantalizing promise, edged bright with inexperience, just enough curiosity and want lacing his tone to make Han’s skin burn with arousal, his cock jerking at the thought of Luke inside him, tucked between his thighs, coming apart with only Han there to see it, to take it all for himself.

He doesn’t say _yes_ but Luke pushes himself to his feet and presses his mouth against Han’s in a clumsy kiss that tells Han clearly enough that he knows what Han wants him to do, wants it just as badly. Luke wraps his hand around Han’s cock, making soft, impatient noises high in his throat as Han kisses him back, looks almost _smug_ when Han pushes him away and orders him to take off his clothes, watching with unreserved interest as Han strips nude as well, their clothes marking a path across the narrow room to Luke’s bunk. He settles at the foot of the bed, legs folded under his body, spread wide, his posture almost meditative, save for the jut of his cock, stiff and pushing at his foreskin, the flush of excitement darkening his fair skin, bringing his scars into sharp contrast.

Han joins him on the bed, pulls him down roughly for a kiss, cradling Luke possessively between his thighs, swallowing Luke’s gasp of pleasure when Han slides a hand down to stroke him, making a mess between them. “You ever done this before?” he murmurs into Luke’s mouth when Luke reciprocates with a firm grip on Han’s erection, and the way Luke’s entire body shudders over him answers him well enough, even before Luke shakes his head, eyes bright in the dim light of the room.

Han kisses him. Touches him. Pulls him down and arches against him, lets himself drown in the hedonistic rush of murmuring instructions against the shell of Luke’s ear, the electric pleasure of seeing and feeling Luke learning him, wanting him, opening him. When Luke pushes inside him the first time, exhaling a breath that speaks to control and desire and uncertainty and lust, Han groans and rocks his hips up in wordless encouragement, the burn and stretch of Luke sinking deeper into him knocking the breath from his lungs, shivering up his spine. He angles his hips, moving Luke inside him. Shudders when Luke moves against him in counterpoint, finding the spot they both want him to stroke and pressing against it, deep and relentless.

He outlasts Luke, but only just, wound tense with the urgency of arousal as Luke cries out and mounts him roughly, his rhythm falling apart as he reaches his peak, climaxing on deep, jerking thrusts, eyes squeezed tightly shut, hands gripping desperately at Han’s hips, his entire being shivering through the final spasms. Han drags his hands up Luke’s arms as Luke comes down from it, pulls him down for a messy, breathless kiss. Luke whines softly into his mouth as he pulls himself free, sliding down Han’s body with a tired sort of determination, his mouth warm and wet and exactly what Han wants and needs when he settles between Han’s thighs, fingers and tongue and throat bringing Han to a shuddering climax within minutes.

He’s quiet, afterwards, lying on his back after Han’s summoned the energy to drag himself out of bed to clean up the mess they’ve made of him, moves over to make room when Han returns, pulling the blanket over them with half-hearted enthusiasm.

“I need to go back,” he says once Han’s settled against him, his voice low, a steady rumble that Han feels more than hears, his cheek pressed against Luke’s ribs. Not the most comfortable position he’s ever been in, but it’s where he landed and where he’s stayed, too wrung out to move.

“Back?” Han says, gesturing vaguely with one hand.

“Back to the Alliance. The Republic. They need me. Us.”

“Yeah? How d’you figure that?”

Luke draws a long, slow breath, his chest expanding enough to dislodge Han from his spot. Han pushes himself up, leans an elbow into the pillow, his chin resting on his hand. Looks at the man beside him, blue eyes gone grey in the half-light of the room, face lined with scars and the strain the past. Throat working as Luke swallows.

“I can tell,” Luke says, finally. “I can see it. When I focus.” He turns his head, his hair scrubbing against his pillow. Meets Han’s gaze, blinking slowly. “It’s clearer after we do this. Easier to focus and listen.”

A completely inappropriate thrill shoots down Han’s spine, settling in his groin. He drags his fingertips down the scars wrapped across Luke’s chest to the softness of his belly, traces the edges of his navel. “I wondered,” he says, without thinking.

“Wondered?” Luke echoes.

Han lifts an eyebrow at him. “You’ve spent more time in my bunk distractin’ me than you have anywhere else since we left Endor,” he says, an exaggeration that Luke allows with just a soft snort to mark its passing. “I thought maybe it was just my old rugged charm working its magic on you.” He leaves Luke’s navel alone, curls his hand around Luke’s side, instead. Drags his thumb over one of the more prominent scars, as if his touch could smooth the skin, wipe away the memory of pain. “Should’a known you had an ulterior motive.”

“I did,” Luke admits, “but not entirely. I did -- I _do_ want you, like this.”

“Reassuring,” Han says, dryly.

“You want me, too.”

“Glad you noticed.”

“I can feel it,” Luke says after a breath, like an afterthought. “Almost hear it, when you’re thinking about it.” He’s quiet, his body going unnaturally still. “You’re trying to decide if it’s intuition or the Force,” he says, after a moment. “It’s both. A mixture.” A beat. “I think.”

Han stops rubbing Luke’s side. “You pick that outta my head or something?” he says.

Luke shrugs, the sheet pulling awkwardly under his shoulders. “You were thinking it pretty loudly.”

“Do I do that a lot?” Han says stupidly.

“Yes.”

“How often?”

Luke yawns, only half covering his mouth with his hand. “Usually when you’re under stress,” he says. “I hear you a lot when you’re working. Makes it easier to help when I know what you’re thinking.”

The calm of his tone sits ill with Han, grates against his nerves like a physical presence. “Dunno how I feel about that, Luke,” he says. “Don’t need you messin’ around with my head, even if it helps us get stuff done.”

“I don’t mess with your head,” Luke says. “I just listen sometimes.” He blinks slowly, sleep creeping over his features like a shadow. His hand drops to Han’s forearm, fingers curling gently around muscles stretched taut, feathering over soft hair. “I do with our marks, though. Sometimes.”

“Do what?” Han says, even as the answer comes to him, sliding across his thoughts like cold engine grease. “Mess with ‘em? Or listen in on what they’re thinking?”

“I make ... _suggestions,”_ Luke says, slowly. “If they’re suspicious of us or trying to double-deal. If we’re in trouble because of it.”

Which explains quite a lot, Han realizes, the pieces coming together, rushing over him like a fever, his mind struggling to sort the thoughts jumbling together, knocking against his skull. The lack of running and shooting and barely escaping with his skin and ship and first mate intact, the losses they’ve not suffered since Luke came on board. The compliance of even the shiftiest of characters, happy to buy and sell and deliver on promises of payment seemingly without a second thought.

The thought that Luke -- the bratty farm-boy from the middle of nowhere whose ideals and passions have almost gotten him (and Han) killed more times than Han cares to count -- has become a better smuggler and dealer overnight follows hot on the heels of _that_ particular train of thought, and the notion that he’s adopted Han’s lifestyle as quickly and effortlessly as he did because of some outdated religion Han doesn’t even _believe_ in half the time is grating. Irritating. _Infuriating._

Beside him, Luke laughs. “I’m just helping,” he says. “You’re still the expert on smuggling.”

“Get outta my head, brat,” Han growls.

“Not in it,” Luke says around another yawn.

He drops off to sleep before Han can ask if he’s lying.

 

 

 

 

Oops there’s the smut. It’s even worse in the next installment.


	8. Air

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You ever done this before?” Han asks before Luke has the chance to do much more than kiss him, nude and hard and wanting, cradled between his thighs, Luke’s knees aching already against the thin mattress beneath them. Looks pleased when Luke shakes his head, shivering under the touch of Han’s fingers, tracing his scars, an unconscious habit that Han has developed over their months together and Luke has come to love.
> 
> “I can show you,” Han breathes against the shell of his ear. “Give me your hand.”

_Luke_

Leia is more powerful than she knows.

She settles beside Luke in the circle of light shed by the fire some of the younger pilots built, controlled and proper in her uniform, no longer the carefree young woman who hugged him just a handful of nights before, her long hair tangling in his hands when he hugged her back, her feet bare in the moss, toes delicate and vulnerable against the hard leather of his boots. Luke greets her with a smile and a nod of his head, reaches out to sense her, but she meets him halfway, blocking him unconsciously, her mind solid against his as she leans into him, close enough to speak without others hearing.

“Are you all right?” she says, soft and strategic. A commander gathering intel more than a sister concerned with her brother’s well-being. “I saw Han with you, near where -- where you put Vader to rest. I was worried about you.”

The word _father_ passes between them, unspoken. Luke nods.

“I’m fine,” he says. “You?”

“Fine, of course,” she says, dismissive in a way that speaks of finality, the topic closed. “We’re working on establishing connections within the Imperial Forces. Defectors are more forthcoming, now that the Emperor is gone. Our cause is gaining traction, finally.”

 _Our cause._ Luke forces a smile, reaches over to lace his fingers with hers. “It is,” he says. “But don’t --” He cuts himself off, breathing the ash mingling with the night air. “Be careful that it doesn’t consume you,” he says. “It can, when you’re this close to it.”

Beside him, Leia sighs. “I don’t have much else,” she says. “It can consume me all it wants. Might not find me suited to its tastes.”

She’s making a joke, or trying to, at least. It doesn’t work. Luke chuckles anyway, humoring her, and she rewards him with a smile.

\---

“You’re sure about this?” Han says, hours later, his hands prepping the _Falcon_ for launch as if on autopilot, muscle memory riding long years of practice.

“Yes,” Luke says.

\---

He sleeps with Han for the first time that night out of desperation, his mind too clogged with thoughts and memories and regrets and fears for him to meditate, the Dark Side of the Force pulling at him like a physical touch when he settles on the bunk in his quarters and tries. So he knocks at Han’s door, instead, answers _everything okay, kid?_ with a rushed, graceless kiss that Han answers with surprise first and a growl second, his hand sliding down to cup Luke’s ass, as simple and eager as ever. Luke swallows Han’s noise of surprise when he answers the hand on his ass with his hand on Han’s cock, soft in the folds of Han’s trousers but firming quickly enough under Luke’s touch. Huffs a breathless laugh when Han tries and fails to strip him bare, the fasteners of his belt pulled tight under the weight of his lightsaber, hanging heavy between them, the thick fabric of his tunic uncooperative as Han tries to push it away.

The sight of Han shrugging out of his clothes, so familiar on the pebbled shores they’ve shared as friends and so completely foreign in the artificial light and close quarters of his bunk brings a wave of _want_ as dark as any hatred Luke’s ever felt, rushing through him, obscuring the hesitation of inexperience like a fog. He steps close, still half-dressed himself, and pulls at the fasteners of Han’s trousers, opens them just enough for his hand to slip between skin and fabric to _feel,_ coarse hair and hard flesh and Han groaning softly, mouthing kisses across Luke’s lips and chin, down the line of his throat. He pulls Luke’s hands away long enough to strip himself, no shyness or hesitation in the motion. Lies back on the bunk, spread out like something from Luke’s more sordid fantasies, watching with humor lighting his eyes as Luke undresses as well and joins him, feeling the press of Han’s skin against his own for the first time without the cool touch of water between them.

He doesn’t last long, once Han rolls him and touches him, stroking him and kissing him and rocking against him with a mindless sort of push for gratification. Doesn’t hesitate to reciprocate, uncoordinated and muzzy though he is in the aftermath of orgasm, his mouth at Han’s throat and hand wrapped around Han’s cock, Han’s come mingling with his own in a slippery mess between them. Arguably the best orgasm he’s ever had, the echoes of Han’s pleasure drawing shudders through his frame as Han leans down and kisses him, breathless and sloppy.

It’s quiet, afterwards. Balance settles like water across Luke’s mind, even as he pulls away from Han’s touch, cupping his hands over the mess on his skin, containing it well enough to not drip as he steps into the ‘fresher to clean up.

“Stay,” Han says, reaching sleepily for him when he returns and pulls on his trousers. “Jus’ for tonight.”

“Tomorrow, maybe,” Luke promises, temptation pulling him down to taste one last kiss.

He returns to his own bunk, leaves his tunic folded at the foot of the mattress, his legs folded, back straight. The familiar posture of meditation, flavored across the years with too many memories and emotions to count. He reaches out and feels the Force straight away, clear and vibrant against his mind. Sorts through his thoughts and feelings for darkness and doubt and anger and pain, considers each before moving on to the next. Eyes closed, he focuses his mind, reaching through the Force to lift his folded tunic and set it at the head of the bed, his brow furrowing as he unclips his lightsaber from the belt he left on the other side of the room, sets it on the shelf by the door without a sound, careful to feel its edges, its balance as he sets it down. He reaches out further, feeling Chewbacca’s presence in the cockpit, attentive but distracted, probably tinkering with some system or another while the _Falcon_ flies. Further still to feel Han’s presence, clouded despite his physical nearness, Han’s mind dulled in sleep, not quite dreaming.

When Luke sleeps, himself, he doesn’t dream.

\---

He remains on the _Falcon_ the following day, ostensibly looking over the wiring for the secondary navigation system when Han finds him, offering to brief him on the plan but clearly relieved when Luke shakes his head and says he’ll sit this one out, Han’s old prejudices coming into plain view, his first impression of Luke -- brash and loud and utterly incapable of taking care of himself, dependent on Han and old Ben and Leia for protection and support and care -- surfacing as he imagines working Luke into what even Luke can tell is a pretty safe con.

He works on the nav-system while Han and Chewbacca argue about trivial details, Luke’s grasp of Wookiee language weak still but sufficient to bring a smile to his face as Chewbacca calls Han all sorts of names, calls him old and rusted and cowardly and dim-witted. They argue about how best to approach, how to open, what to do if things start to go sour, the prices to name, conditions to set. Han gets his way more than Chewbacca does, from what Luke can tell. Storms around in a sulk anyway until they leave, pulling the tough space pirate act over himself like a cowl.

Luke follows them minutes after they depart, a silvery twilight sinking around the spaceport, throwing shadows into long tangles around him, keeps sufficient distance to avoid Chewbacca’s keen sense of smell, Han’s heightened sense of his surroundings. He buys something fried on a stick from a street vendor when Han and Chewbacca duck into a nearby parts shop, eating mechanically without tasting the food in his mouth as he reaches out with the Force, touching Han’s familiar presence, Han’s thoughts rushing like a fire-fight.

He knows the merchant behind the counter, Luke sees, rifling through past memories that flare up as Han approaches. Knew her before she lost two of the fingers on her upper right hand, before she had the scar running from forehead to the curved ridge of bone near her right ear. He isn’t expecting a warm welcome and doesn’t get one, forcing a laugh when the merchant spits a question at him, his defenses rising as he talks to her, optimism coming slow and blossoming late in their charged verbal exchange, fortunes turning undeniably in Han’s favor.

Luke licks grease from his fingers and slips into the shadows, watchful as Han steps out of the shop, hands in his pockets and shoulders slumped in an almost-perfect affect of disappointment to cover the success of the meeting, his mind already on the next step in his plan, the next mark to visit, the double-deal he’ll pull off perfectly, so long as nothing goes wrong, all of it as easy and natural as the breath he pulls into his lungs. Luke slips into the shop after Han and Chewbacca’s shadows have melted into the darkness of night and reaches out for the shopkeeper’s thoughts as she demands to know what he wants, the temptation to do what he can stronger than the nagging thought that he oughtn’t.

She poses no threat to Han’s plans. Luke remains in the shop just long enough to see that she stays that way.

\---

“Good to know I haven’t lost my touch,” Han says the following evening when the exchange has been made and they’re all a little wealthier for it, neither he nor Luke drunk but working their way towards it, Han’s breath heavy with alcohol, intoxicating against Luke’s lips.

Luke hums his agreement and slides into Han’s lap, happy to distract him from thinking too hard about anything at all.

\---

A month passes. Two. Luke learns, following Han into every filthy corner of the galaxy, honing his skills while Han smuggles and swindles and makes all of them very rich very quickly. It bothers him, Luke can tell, Han’s thoughts clouded with concern whenever things go well, his own reassurances to himself tucked deep in his private musings that it all boils down to luck, to having another partner around to help out, fictional excuses flimsy and falling apart with even the littlest bit of critical consideration.

Sex distracts him, silences his worries, his suspicions, much to Luke’s guilty delight. He learns Han’s body along with the ins and outs of the smuggling business, learns to use his own body to pull pleasure and desperation from Han, the two of them wrapped up in each other during the long stretches between clandestine meetings and blood-racing trades. Feels the rush of Han’s pleasure wrapping around him afterwards, warm and seductive.

“I can do more, if you want,” he breathes against the length of Han’s cock the night he gets a little more adventurous than usual with his hand, his touch bringing to Han’s mind a memory of Lando, of all people, that makes Luke’s cock jerk against his thigh, making a mess when he tastes the blind _wanting_ Han feels in response to his offer, no gentleness in his touch as he yanks Luke to his feet, pulls him over to his bunk.

“You ever done this before?” Han asks before Luke has the chance to do much more than kiss him, nude and hard and wanting, cradled between his thighs, Luke’s knees aching already against the thin mattress beneath them. Looks pleased when Luke shakes his head, shivering under the touch of Han’s fingers, tracing his scars, an unconscious habit that Han has developed over their months together and Luke has come to love.

“I can show you,” Han breathes against the shell of his ear. “Give me your hand.”

\---

Luke lies on his back, afterwards, breathing hard and staring without seeing at the ceiling of Han’s quarters, Han a sprawl of limbs and aimless kisses at his side, the haze of stretched muscles and swirl of endorphins as rich as a drug, a poison between them.

 _“They’re all right,”_ he hears Leia say, her voice all at once distant and close by, as intimate as Han’s breath across his chest, Han’s fingertips wandering aimlessly along the lines of his scars. _“I can feel it. They’ll be back when they’re ready.”_

“I need to go back,” he says into the darkness.

 

 

 

 

Today was the worst day I’ve had in _years._ Leave me some love if you have some to spare?


	9. Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Han levels a glare at the half-smile struggling to spread across Luke’s face, holds it even when Luke settles on the bunk beside him and leans in to kiss him, mismatched hands cupping his jaw, keeping him still despite their awkward position. He doesn’t resist when Luke pulls away long enough to climb into his lap, lets his hands rest lightly on the curve of Luke’s backside as they kiss again, sinking into the familiarity of Luke’s quiet passion, the weight of him a comfort.
> 
> “Thank you,” Luke says, pulling away and resting his forehead against Han’s, his eyes closed, “for coming back with me."

_Han_

They take one last job before returning to the Republic, then another that comes up just as they’re finishing the first, both taken at Luke’s quiet suggestion, wickedness slipping into his calm tone as he mentions them to Han, like he’s fully aware that he’s breaking a rule, fully confident he’s going to get away with it. Which he does, Han always more than happy to do whatever puts credits in his pocket and Luke in his bunk, even if only for one or two nights more, as always more comfortable in the freedom of the shadows of the galaxy than in the glaring light of responsibility and order.

Still, it’s not _his_ idea to delay their return, but it’s _his_ cheek Leia slaps first chance she gets, nonetheless, Luke getting a hug afterwards that lasts long enough for Han’s shock to wear off and annoyance to set in, his temper crawling up his throat and out on a string of curses and insults and accusations that would make even the most seasoned criminal lift an eyebrow in shock. Leia meets him curse for curse, still more of a rebel and a soldier and a fighter than a princess or a diplomat or a politician. She’s gotten herself a following of admirers during Han’s absence, a group of pilots and engineers and other riff-raff gathering at the edge of the commotion, flanking Leia like they think she can’t take Han by herself. Which she _can’t,_ for all that she can, has before, and sets about doing now.

“We _needed_ you,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest when Han runs out of insults and demands to know why she’s so worked up.

 _“Me?”_ Han spits.

 _“All_ of you,” Leia says. “We’d won a battle, Han. Not the war. Surely you knew that.”

“Oh I knew that, your Haughtiness,” Han snaps, “but that doesn’t mean --”

“He did, Leia,” Luke cuts in, his voice quiet but firm, enough to choke the rest of Han’s retort into silence. _“We_ did. But we had things to take care of first. It took longer than I’d expected it would. I’m sorry.”

Han’s chest squirms a little at Luke’s steady, even tone, his own temper still boiling hot. Leia turns her glare on her brother, studies him for a long minute.

“We’ll talk about it later,” she says, coolly. She turns and motions for one of the cadets ogling the proceedings, brings him to her side with little more than a gesture of her hand. “Find them quarters,” she orders, a sharp salute answering her. She gives Han a look that lasts a bit too long, looks at her brother. “I’ll come find you when I have a moment.”

She stalks off into the immediate dispersal of the crowd, control radiating around her like a blast of cold air. Han watches her go, motionless until Luke nudges his arm, drawing his attention away from her retreating form, small alongside the soldiers surrounding her.

“She’s been learning,” he murmurs as he and Han fall into step behind the cadet charged with minding them, a young Durosian who isn’t terribly subtle about sending curious looks at them over his shoulder. “You shouldn’t lie to her when you’re upset. She’ll know.”

The thought of returning to the _Falcon_ at a dead run and escaping a Leia Organa who can get into his head as easily as Luke apparently can flashes through Han’s mind, guilt following on its wings, heavy and sour. Beside him, Luke chuckles softly, not even _trying_ to pretend he’s not listening. Han swats at him. Thinks _cut that out, Luke_ as loudly as he can, jaw set in a frown.

“No gratitude for bringin’ you back in one piece,” he grouses after the cadet’s done his duty and disappeared, leaving Han the freedom to bang on Luke’s door and crowd his personal space, the quarters they’ve been assigned cramped even in comparison with Han’s bunk on the _Falcon._ “Don’t know what I expected outta her. She never could stand me whenever she had her clothes on.” He slants a look sideways at Luke, watching for a reaction to his slip-of-the-tongue about his past with Leia. Luke’s face could be carved from stone, for all the reaction he gives.

“She wasn’t expecting you to be with me,” he tells Han, words measured and even.

“Where the hell else would I be.”

Luke shrugs. “She didn’t know. She was glad to see you.”

“Helluva way to show it,” Han grumbles, rubbing his cheek, the memory of Leia’s slap more painful to his ego than his face. “You’re two peas in a pod, you and your sister. Never can get a read on either of you. And now that you can _both_ get in my head --”

“Han --”

“-- and I’m guessin’ you can’t teach a guy like me to block you out, keep you from listening to whatever I’m thinkin’ about --”

_“Han.”_

Han levels a glare at the half-smile struggling to spread across Luke’s face, holds it even when Luke settles on the bunk beside him and leans in to kiss him, mismatched hands cupping his jaw, keeping him still despite their awkward position. He doesn’t resist when Luke pulls away long enough to climb into his lap, lets his hands rest lightly on the curve of Luke’s backside as they kiss again, sinking into the familiarity of Luke’s quiet passion, the weight of him a comfort.

“Thank you,” Luke says, pulling away and resting his forehead against Han’s, his eyes closed, “for coming back with me. And I’m sorry Leia’s mad at you. I’ll talk to her, tell her it was my idea for us to leave.”

“Don’t,” Han says immediately, his voice sharp enough that Luke cocks his head at him, sitting back. “Let her be mad at me for this,” Han clarifies. “Save her the trouble of finding somethin’ else I did that she doesn’t like.” He gives Luke’s backside a squeeze. “Like this. Ain’t gonna be pretty when she finds out I’ve ruined her brother.”

Luke chuckles softly, fidgeting absently with the collar of Han’s vest. “You haven’t ruined me, Han,” he says.

“Did my best,” Han says.

“You did. I wanted you to.”

“You -- what?”

Luke shrugs, drags the tip of his index finger down Han’s sternum. “I’ve been selfish,” he says, after a moment.

“Nothin’ wrong with that.”

He pulls Luke down and kisses him, pleased when Luke kisses him back, Luke’s obvious pleasure washing over him, gentle and warm and unrushed, not unlike the late hours they spent together on the _Falcon,_ long stolen moments between jobs, warm like the time they spent together in the lake on Roh'kna, what feels like a lifetime ago. He shifts Luke out of his lap when Luke’s weight starts to make his legs go numb, pressing kisses wherever he can reach as he rolls them, not quite pinning Luke to the bed. Kisses Luke some more, because he can, because of the quiet sounds Luke makes when he’s kissed, warm and content.

He isn’t best pleased when Luke pushes him away precious few seconds later and sits up, holds on to fragile hope that maybe it’s a ploy on Luke’s part to push him over and climb on top of him, but that’s quashed when Luke looks to the door and says _Leia’s coming,_ donning as he says it the cool, emotionless persona Han once thought of as the Jedi knight act and now catches himself thinking of as Luke’s smuggler act.

“I don’t think this is how she needs to see us,” Luke says, looking down at Han, the act only somewhat ruined by the sparkle of mischief in his eyes when he adds, “not right now.”

“Not ever, if I can help it,” Han grumbles, reaching down to adjust his erection in his trousers, making it a little less obvious. “She’ll skin me alive.”

Luke shakes his head. “She wouldn’t. And I’d protect you if she did,” he says, his voice a little too sincere for Han’s tastes, like he means it, like he thinks Han needs his protection.

Leia, to her credit, has none of her fiery temper on exhibit when she comes into the room, nodding to her brother in acknowledgement when Luke opens the door. She shows no surprise at finding Han in Luke’s quarters, offers Han a cool, even apology straight away, thanks him for returning. Doesn’t blink as she speaks, a dead giveaway that she’s been practicing.

“It’s been a rough few weeks,” she says, when Luke breaks the brittle silence that follows her apology and Han’s acceptance thereof, asking her if she’s all right. She waves away his invitation for her to sit in the only chair in the room, crosses her arms over her chest, defensive and strong. “The Empire was shaken by the loss of the Emperor and ... Vader. But the Empire’s too big, too far-reaching for the loss of a few leaders to dismantle the operation. They’re strengthening again, and it’s been challenging, anticipating their moves while trying to establish order. With and without their figureheads.”

“You’re sure they’re gone?” Han says, dropping to the edge of Luke’s bunk, mindful of Leia’s sensitivity to the height difference between them. “Vader and the Emperor both -- seems a stretch that they wouldn’t have an escape plan for at least one of ‘em, especially after we took out the first _Death Star._ Could be they’re in the shadows, helping push the --”

“They’re not,” Luke says, cutting him off.

Leia looks at him, at Han. “We have confirmation of both deaths,” she says, carefully. “It’s the remaining ideology we’re up against.”

“You’re sure?” Han says.

“Yes.”

“And you needed us for that?” Han says. “Fightin’ ideology isn’t my strong suit, Princess. You know that.”

“Yes, I know, and yes, we need you.” Leia says like a weary recitation. She puts a hand up when Han opens his mouth to argue with her, the lines of stress around her eyes when she closes them and pinches the bridge of her nose enough to shut him up. “And yes, Han, before you ask, I mean that. _Both_ of you. Not just Luke.”

Han covers his surprise with an exaggerated shrug, turns away from the searching look Leia’s giving him to gauge Luke’s reaction, which is, predictably, unreadable. Luke meets his gaze for half a heartbeat before coming over to sit beside him on the bed, his movements fluid and controlled. Leia hesitates, then sits in the chair across from them, as graceful as Luke, just as tightly controlled. Settling in like she’s come to parley, weapons placed in plain view, tension rich in the air.

A moment passes in brittle silence. Then Leia sighs, crumpling a little, rubbing her fingertips against her temple.

“Is it _always_ this loud?” she says.

Luke darts a glance at Han. Looks back at his sister. “No,” he says.

“Is what loud?” Han says, looking between the twins.

Luke ignores him. “Don’t try to guess what he’s thinking,” he says. “You’re probably triggering it with that.”

“Triggering _what?”_ Han says, even as the answer presents itself before him, loud and bright and uncomfortable.

“It’s worse when he’s under pressure,” Luke adds.

“I’ve seen him in a firefight,” Leia says. “In an asteroid field. With a _Star Destroyer_ firing on us.” She squints at her brother. “It wasn’t this bad, then.”

“You’ve gotten stronger,” Luke says. He sounds almost proud, the expression on his face startlingly similar to the way he looked after the first time he brought Han to orgasm completely hands-free, memory rising fast and hot in Han’s mind, Luke kneeling behind him, gripping him with bruising force, Han’s fingers wrapped white-knuckle around the bar at the head of his bunk, sweat gathering on his skin, his voice rough and wrecked as he --

Luke punches him none-too-gently, jarring him out of memory and back to the present. “There are ways to block it out,” he says in a hurry. “I can teach you.”

“Please,” Leia says. “It’s bad enough to have to listen to what he’s saying. I’ll go mad if I have to hear what he’s thinking, too.”

“Nobody asked you to listen,” Han grouses, folding his arms over his chest. “I told Luke to get outta my head already, and the same goes for you too, Princess. Don’t need the two’a you snoopin’ around where you aren’t wanted.”

“It isn’t intentional,” Luke says.

“Yeah, well, blocking it out should be,” Han says. His mind’s pulling up all sorts of things he doesn’t want either of them to know about, memories and fantasies and old resentments and even older embarrassments, as if knowing he shouldn’t is all he needs to do it anyway, his characteristic lawlessness catching up to bite him, right in the ass. He points his finger at Luke, then at Leia. “Givin’ your Force-believer religion a bad name, listening in on me like that.”

Leia gives him a withering look, delicate fingers rubbing at her temples, still. Han tries not to think too much about those fingers, about their touch on his skin. Tries to think of _anything_ else when his mind takes the logical leap and compares Leia’s hands with Luke’s, the smooth hands of a princess with the calloused hands of a knight, both more than capable of lighting a fire under his skin, deep in his belly, in his groin. He sucks in a deep breath and thinks about the _Falcon,_ forces himself to think about the delicate wires connecting relays to the flight panel, the intricate schematic of the hyperdrive, the ever-fickle motivator. A glance at Leia brings back whispers of memory, threads of guilt winding their way through, insidious and strong, Han’s breath catching in his throat, his cock swelling against his thigh.

“I wonder,” Leia says, after a moment, sliding her gaze from Han over to Luke, her lips curling wickedly in the sort of smile that never brings anything good Han’s way, “do you suppose I’ve hit a nerve, Luke, listening to all that noise in his head? I must have, to’ve gotten him so _riled up.”_

She and Luke share a smile as different memories flood across Han’s mind, the smell of bacta residue and cold, dry air, the ache in his legs and the weight of pure exhaustion hanging on him like a blanket of wet snow. He swallows around the cocktail of emotion that rises in his throat, the memory of powerlessness just as potent as it was, years before. Slings an arm around Luke’s shoulders, the element of surprise giving him the leverage he needs to pull the younger man close and hold him there.

“Very funny,” he says, to Leia. “But even listenin’ in on my thoughts like you are, I’m guessin’ even _you_ don’t know everything about me yet, _Princess,_ now do you?”

The way Luke’s face drains of color as Han pulls him close and kisses him full on the mouth is almost as gratifying as the expression on Leia’s face when Han pulls away and looks at her, daring her to say anything. She doesn’t, but her expression speaks volumes, her lips pressed tightly together, her gaze transferring from Han to Luke as Luke struggles against Han’s embrace, putting distance between them, his face bright red.

Han lets him go. Treats Leia to his sweetest smile as he leans forward, putting himself right in her personal space in the cramped confines of the room. “And the best part is,” he says, “Luke isn’t my _brother.”_

“Get _out,”_ Leia hisses, pointing at the door. Luke groans.

Han escapes without another word.

 

 

 

 

I don’t really like the idea that the Force gives you the ability to read people’s minds, but I suppose I’ve read it enough times in fiction that my brain picked it up. Also Han why did you fall for these two, they are bad for you.


	10. Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some day, Luke is certain, people will _stop kissing him_ without permission.
> 
> This is not that day.

_Luke_

Leaving is harder than he expects it to be, not unlike the pull he felt in the lakes of Roh'kna and Endor, the Force tugging at him, tempting him back, even when his body was tired, his muscles weak with fatigue and chill. Han doesn’t help, his reluctance to return to the bitter reality of the rebellion -- the Republic, now -- underlining his thoughts and words. They succumb to temptation once together, twice together, returning to the controlled pandemonium of Echo base richer and guiltier for it, the temptation to turn and run like cowards pulling at both of them, souring the silence that settles between them when they send their landing codes to the lieutenant minding incoming ships, too late to turn back once they’re cleared to land.

Luke feels Leia’s presence as he descends the gangplank of the _Falcon,_ covering guilt and misgiving with the same silence and mental walls he pulled around himself when stepping into his father’s presence, accompanying him to audience with the Emperor. Han, in his usual fashion, covers his feelings with irreverence, running his mouth the minute Leia comes into view, grinning down at her as he says _miss me, your Loftiness?_ And Leia, bearing the immense weight of responsibility as steadfastly as ever, answers him with a resounding slap across his cheek, her arms like a vice when she turns her attention to Luke, pulling him into a hug he couldn’t escape if he wanted to, muttering _unbelievable_ against his chest when he hugs her back.

Han reacts with disappointing reliability, bellowing his temper across the hangar, falling into the old electric tension with Leia that Luke’s never quite grown accustomed to sensing between them. He chokes on his words when Luke interrupts their toxic back-and-forth with a practiced half-truth, quiet but riled, Han’s pride as vulnerable as ever to Leia’s accusations and honesty, pock-marked with guilt from the time they spent together, as guilty as Luke of enjoying it, missing it as they stand amidst those who stayed behind and continued to fight.

Leia gives Luke a long, searching look that makes him very nervous, his mental shields going up as fast as he can manage, sloppy in his hurry, distracted as he is by his sister’s temper, close enough for him to taste. “We’ll talk about it later,” Leia tells him, her voice like ice and her mind a mess, half-shielded and half open book, conflicting emotions swirling through her thoughts like bands of color on an oil slick.

“She’s been learning,” Luke warns Han in low tones as they’re escorted like prisoners to their quarters, Han’s thoughts moving sharply across his consciousness, nostalgic want mixed with proud resentment mixed with regret mixed with desperation and irritation. “You shouldn’t lie to her when you’re upset. She’ll know.”

The mental image of the _Falcon_ launching under emergency evacuation protocol drags across his mind, projected from Han’s thoughts as loudly as a shout. Luke laughs softly, gets a gentle punch in the arm for his troubles.

Alone in his quarters, he folds himself into a meditative position and closes his eyes, draws a deep breath that he doesn’t have a chance to exhale before Han distracts him, banging on his door and complaining loudly when Luke lets him in, covering the undercurrent of disquiet he’s had since their conversation about Luke’s role in their smuggling outfit with righteous indignation, the guilt of Leia being right with loud accusations.

“Never could stand me when she had her clothes on,” Han grumbles, and Luke kisses it off his lips, only half-listening to the rest of Han’s angry diatribe as he presses into Han’s thoughts, feeling insecurity and guilt and childish jealousy lurking just beneath the pride and indignation rising brash and bright to the surface. Han makes a soft noise in the back of his throat when Luke climbs into his lap, kissing him until the selfish part of him he’s heard so loudly lately quiets under the rational cool of responsibility and duty, their stolen months together tucked away in his heart like smuggled goods.

“Thank you,” he says, pulling away to rest his forehead against Han’s, his lips going numb from the stubble on Han’s upper lip, chest clenching with regret he has no right to feel, “for coming back with me.”

 _I wouldn’t be anywhere else_ surfaces between them. Luke tucks it away in his heart, as well. “I’m sorry Leia’s mad at you,” he says, even as his mind corrects him to _mad at us._ “I’ll talk to her. Tell her it was my idea for us to leave.”

Something like panic shoots through Han, at that. “Don’t,” he says, almost as quickly. “Let her be mad at me for this. Save her the trouble of finding somethin’ else I did that she doesn’t like. Like this.” He drops his hands to Luke’s backside, gives it a squeeze, Luke’s body responding immediately to the roughness of his touch, the memory of pleasure burning through him at the touch of the fingers digging into his ass. “Ain’t gonna be pretty when she finds out I’ve ruined her brother.”

“You didn’t _ruin_ me, Han,” Luke says on a laugh. “I wanted you to.” _I did well enough to ruin myself on my own,_ he thinks, dragging the tip of his left index finger down Han’s chest, feeling Han’s heartbeat, strong and steady, coming faster under his touch. Tempting him, despite their situation, their location. “I’ve been selfish,” he says, half to himself.

“Nothin’ wrong with that.”

He gives in to temptation and lets Han roll them, pinning him under Han’s greater size and weight, the thrill of submission bringing him fully erect under the teasing press and rub of Han’s body against his. Lust and desperation are almost enough to distract him from sensing Leia’s approach, tightly controlled emotions coiled like a beacon of solid light, bright across Luke’s consciousness. If she can tell what he and Han have been up to just seconds prior to her arrival in Luke’s quarters she gives no indication, her politician facade fully in place as she apologizes to Han and thanks him for his service returning both himself and Luke to the Republic, her expression unreadable until Han casually mentions Vader and Luke doesn’t rein himself in quite quickly enough in his response, his words sharp in the closeness of the room.

Leia looks at him with alarm, _does he know did you tell him about our father does he know_ repeating like a hysterical poem for the heartbeat it takes Luke to shake his head, her relief palpable against his mind. “We have confirmation of both deaths,” she tells Han. “It’s the remaining ideology we’re up against.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

Han doesn’t believe her, Luke can feel it, suspicion winding around his thoughts like one of the snakes on Dagobah. Can’t bring himself to believe it, Luke realizes, without the explanation neither he nor Leia can give him, and it’s wearying like the misery of the headcolds he used to catch as a child after the rare rains on Tatooine, like the drag of sleepless nights in the penetrating cold on Hoth. He settles beside Han on the bunk, wanting to offer comfort and reassurance, the cacophony of Han’s unspoken thoughts louder than usual, tinged red with the fear and panic Luke has only tasted in Han’s worst nightmares, the touch of Vader’s cruelty ripped like a scar across Han’s mind. He listens for only a moment, then draws breath into his lungs, reaching for calm in the Force.

Leia’s sigh distracts him, draws his attention to her mind, the lines of exhaustion on her face. “Is it always this loud?” she says, rubbing her temples.

Luke covers his surprise as best he can, lowering his mental shields enough to listen intentionally to what he assumes she’s hearing, Han’s thoughts a mix of questions and suggestions and misgivings and complaints rushing across his consciousness like wind as he does. “No,” he says, after a moment. He reaches for his sister’s thoughts, feels her curiosity warring against itself. “Don’t try to guess what he’s thinking. You’re probably triggering it with that.”

Realization sweeps across Han’s thoughts, bringing everything else up in volume along with it. Luke tries not to wince.

“It’s worse when he’s under pressure.”

“I’ve seen him in a firefight,” Leia says. “In an asteroid field. With a _Star Destroyer_ firing on us. It wasn’t this bad, then.”

“You’ve gotten stronger,” Luke explains.

Han, for no reason Luke can discern, chooses that particular moment to pull up a detailed and _graphic_ memory Leia does _not_ need to see. Luke punches him for it but it’s too late, Leia looking at him with mild surprise.

“There are ways to block it,” he says by way of apology. “I can teach you.”

“Please,” Leia says, and he’s not heard her so desperate since -- ever, he realizes, guilt twisting under his sternum. She gives him a weak, wintery smile, jerks her head towards Han. “It’s bad enough to have to listen to what he’s saying. I’ll go mad if I have to hear what he’s thinking, too.”

A joke, her attempt to lighten the mood. Luke laughs. Han doesn’t.

“Do you suppose I’ve hit a nerve, Luke?” Leia says, color rising in her cheeks as Han’s thoughts bring a reaction to his physical body, his arousal broadcast as loudly in the tiny room as if he’d stood up and stripped nude in front of them. “To’ve gotten him so _riled up ...”_

Her words dredge up memory in Han’s mind, snow and darkness and pain and worry pressing painfully at Luke’s cheekbone, a phantom headache following in its wake, cold and stale in contrast to the other memories swirling in his mind like warmth. He sees himself, lips blue with cold, blood crusted black across his face. Han’s mittens, spattered with snow, cradling his cheeks. Feels the memory of fear, deep and visceral. Desperation. Pain entirely separate from the cut of the wind, the frigid pull of the snow.

He blinks and it’s gone, Leia’s wicked smile bringing him back to the warm closeness of his quarters, of his sister and lover so close to him, Leia’s expression twisting her features into those of a younger woman, a little girl getting away with something. Luke answers her with a smile of his own, some of the tension in the room draining away for the precious seconds before Han ruins it, draping his arm around Luke’s shoulders and pulling with more force than he needs to, really, jarring Luke out of the moment, surprise deafening Luke to ill intention he’s otherwise certain he should have been able to sense.

Some day, Luke is certain, people will _stop kissing him_ without permission.

This is not that day.

“And the best part is,” Han says, after Luke’s shoved him away, Leia’s temper rising like a sandstorm with each word that comes out of his mouth, electric and deadly, “Luke isn’t my _brother.”_

He leaves Luke alone with Leia’s fury, escaping as embarrassment thickens in the space between them. Luke meets his sister’s searching gaze with his mental shields firmly in place after it’s been long enough that he feels guilty for staring at the floor like a guilty teenager awaiting a scolding. Waits for her to ask, which she does, each word measured and intentional.

“So I _was_ interpreting that correctly,” she says, slowly, each word measured and careful. “Those were memories, not fantasies. Weren’t they.”

Luke nods. “They are,” he says. “Leia, I’m --”

“Is that why you left?” she says, her voice louder by a degree, covering his aborted apology.

Guilt pulls like a noose around Luke’s throat. “Among other reasons,” he says, enough truth behind the statement that he hopes she’ll buy it.

She does, so far as he can tell. “Well,” she says. “That’s that, then. I don’t know why I should even be surprised.” She leans back in the chair, plasteel creaking quietly in protest, laces her fingers atop her crossed legs. “How long will you be with us this time?”

“I’m not leaving again,” Luke says, guilt redoubling itself in his throat. “I promise. This was just --”

“-- the third time,” Leia cuts in. She looks at him, her eyes cold. Doesn’t blink. “After Hoth. Tatooine. Endor. It’s a habit of yours, but I can’t quite see the pattern. I’m never sure when it’s going to happen again.” She swallows, looks down at her hands, still folded properly in her lap, her right thumb tapping an impatient rhythm against the left. There’s a mark across her knuckles, a bruise or a scar or a smudge of dirt, Luke can’t tell. A silver band around her left wrist he doesn’t recognize, can’t quite tell if it’s decorative or functional. “You could tell me, you know. I wouldn’t try to stop you.”

 _You’ve always tried to stop Han_ slips through before Luke can catch it and reel it in. He watches his sister’s eyes go wide, just for a second. Watches her pull in her surprise and control it, likely on impulse, not the conscious action he uses when emotion tries to overwhelm logic, pulling his mental shields up as fast and firm as he can.

“It’s different with Han,” she says. _“Was_ different. That’s all in the past.”

“Leia, I’m -- I’m sorry. Really, I am.”

“Sorry?” Leia echoes. “What for? That’s how he _is,_ Luke. And I don’t care, especially, except that he might hurt you. It seems to be his pattern, and I don’t want that to happen to you.”

Luke shakes his head. “He won’t.”

“That’s what I thought,” Leia says, arching an eyebrow, more anger than pain in her tone, both dulled, aged as the words hang between them.

“We’re not -- it’s not that serious,” Luke says, and the words are foul on his tongue, either too much truth or too much a lie, he can’t tell. “I went with him because I wanted -- I thought --”

He gestures helplessly. Leia reaches across the space between them and captures his hand, draws it down to her knee, soothing it against the heavy fabric of her trousers. “It’s all right,” she says, quiet and gentle, ever the sympathetic leader, the royalty raised to love her people. Not at all the hot-blooded sibling he’s known only in small doses, in stolen glimpses. “You don’t have to explain it.”

Luke turns his hand, wraps it around hers. “Thanks.”

Leia squeezes his hand. “Now,” she says, “where this has been _fun,_ we do still have work to do. Do you think you’re up for a strategy meeting? We received some intel right before you made your grand entrance. Your insights would be most welcome if you’re not too tired.”

Luke is exhausted, wants nothing more than to slink back to the _Falcon,_ defeated and craven and weak in the face of his own failures. “Of course not,” he lies to his sister. “I’d be honored to attend.”

\---

Standing around the glow of the holodisplay with soldiers known and unknown, Luke learns.

The Republic has lost three hundred fifty-two pilots, five hundred ninety-four ground soldiers and two hundred-odd spies and informants in the months following the Battle of Endor, all at the hands of the Imperial forces scrambling to knit order over the gaping hole left in the wake of Luke’s battle with the Emperor and the destruction of the _Death Star._

The Empire has lost an estimated one thousand six hundred twenty-seven ships, fighters, and carriers, countless Stormtroopers, and secure footholds in seven to ten systems, depending on the source and judgement criteria, and hasn’t quite figured out how to scare information into silence, especially among the higher ranks; a pleasant surprise for the newly founded Republic.

There have been no known defectors among Republic loyalists so far, with two notable exceptions.

Luke bows his head and apologizes. Han is nowhere to be seen.

No one openly seems to miss him.

 

 

 

 

Well _this_ chapter was a mess! I thought I’d cleaned it up, but no. Had to re-write half of it, all while treadmilling. I reached a million steps yesterday for 2016. A million steps! Probably half of those happened while I was writing this story. Good times.


	11. Land

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Luke moves his kisses back down, stopping to tickle under Han’s ear. Makes a soft sound deep in his throat when Han shies away from the ticklish touch and kisses him on the mouth, sloppy with the remnants of sleep.
> 
> He’s too tired for more than that, happy enough to kiss Luke until sleep pulls him back under. It’s a few hours before he wakes again, and when he does, Luke is gone.

_Han_

“That was very childish of you, you know.”

Luke’s voice cuts through the murmur of dream, long hours of solitude later, the touch of his fingers sliding through Han’s hair dragging Han slowly to consciousness, comforting and steady as sleep sloughs away and brings Han back to the reality of his bunk aboard the _Falcon,_ the familiar shadows and smell of engine grease and weight of Luke beside him, warm and real when Han slings an arm around him, pulling at his hips, intent on getting him to lie down and be still and be _quiet,_ to join him in the tatters of sleep calling for him to close his eyes and let them reclaim him.

Luke’s touch won’t allow for it. He curls his fingers in Han’s hair and gives it a tug, amusement curling at the corner of his mouth when Han looks up at him, bleary and annoyed.

“Wha’?” Han manages.

“That was childish of you,” Luke says again. “Kissing me in front of Leia. After you’d _just_ said you’d hoped she wouldn’t find out.”

Han yawns and rolls onto his back. “Honesty’s th’best policy,” he slurs, moving his arm higher to wrap around Luke’s waist. Kind of. Enough that he’ll know if Luke tries to bail and can complain about it. “She’d find out ‘ventually.”

“She already knew, that isn’t the point,” Luke says.

“She jealous?” Han says, cracking open one eye. Tired as he is, he can’t quite convince himself that there isn’t a note of hope in his own voice, that it wouldn’t just make his day for Leia to be envious, of him or Luke he doesn’t trust himself to know.

Luke shakes his head. “Rude,” he says, a rueful smile on his lips. “She still feels very strongly about you, you know. I didn’t want her to have to see it. That I -- took you. Away from her.”

Han snorts dismissal and paws at Luke’s side, has to wake up more than he wants in order to get Luke to lie down beside him, moulded against his side in a way that brings back memories of the months just passed, memories of Luke wearing something other than his Jedi blacks every day, slipping in and out of the shadows, working alongside Han and Chewbacca like he was born to work in the underbelly of distant worlds. Memories of Luke’s grin stretching wicked at the end of their more successful days, his body pliant and responsive to Han’s touch, to Han’s kisses, the two of them wrapped up in each other in the tentative safety of Han’s bunk, nothing stretching out before them but the pursuit of physical pleasure and the next thrill, the next big con leading to the next big haul --

“I enjoyed it,” Luke breathes against Han’s neck, pressing a line of kisses along Han’s collarbone. He’s hard, at least partially, firmness warm against Han’s hip when he presses close, arching up to kiss Han’s throat. “Our time together.”

_It isn’t over yet_ flits across Han’s mind with urgent petulance he more often associates with the brat-turned-hero he turns to kiss than with himself, Luke’s amusement obvious in the curve of his lips, the burst of laughter warm against Han’s cheek. He moves his kisses back down, stopping to tickle under Han’s ear. Makes a soft sound deep in his throat when Han shies away from the ticklish touch and kisses him on the mouth, sloppy with the remnants of sleep.

He’s too tired for more than that, happy enough to kiss Luke until sleep pulls him back under. It’s a few hours before he wakes again, and when he does, Luke is gone.

\---

Weeks pass.

Han helps where he can, listening in on the Imperials’ communications with Leia’s team of spies, Threepio’s constant chattering presence at his side enough to set his teeth on edge. Leads a mission with a squadron of Commander Antilles’ newer pilots, posing as a dealer to provide weapons to a sleeper cell of rebels in a neighboring system. Sticks around long enough after that mission’s wrapped to sell damaged shield components to a middleman well-known to deal with Imperial buyers, which means he’s got an easier time of it the next time Leia sends him out to engage directly with the enemy, manages to knock out the navigation systems on three TIE Fighters instead of sending them to kingdom come, chases them down to the surface of a moon and brings Leia back three prisoners for interrogation.

Leia conducts interrogations herself. She’s effective. Wears the same cool mask of indifference as she steps into the cell-block that Luke always wore when helping Han work a particularly stubborn mark. Looks older, every time she steps back out, her mouth set in a thin line as she speaks with General Rieekan, adjusting plans and attacks and strategies.

The TIE Fighter pilots never come back out of the cell block. Han is careful not to think too hard about it.

He’s offered a mission to his homeworld of Corellia a week after the TIE fighters’ interrogation, accepts with a grimace on his face and cold growing in his heart, the foreboding dread of what he might find left in the wake of Imperial occupation settling like a physical presence around his ribs. Leia sees it, of course -- there’s little she _doesn’t_ see, which inspires awe in her troops and fear in her equals and in Han alike -- and touches him gently on the hand. Tells him he doesn’t have to go, if he doesn’t want to. That she can send someone else, find some other mission for him to complete for her. For the Republic.

Her touch burns his hand, the memory of it tingling as he pushes the _Falcon_ into lightspeed, Chewbacca silent beside him, steadfast. A comfort. 

He sets their course and leaves Chewbacca to mind the navigation, distracts himself with the never-ending maintenance of the _Falcon,_ her familiar curves and edges a welcome distraction under his hands. She’s in better shape than she’s ever been, her well-being considered an asset to the Republic, now, not just to Han and Han’s personal wealth. Doesn’t need the attention Han gives her half as much as Han needs to see to her systems, wires and hydraulics and stubborn bolts twisted on too tightly.

Luke is waiting for them when they land in Corellia, just north of the Eastern Sea.

He’s striking in his Jedi blacks, a still presence among the scattered earthtones around him, his hands clasped behind his back, no emotion showing on his face. He’s let his hair grow longer than it was the last time Han saw him, dark blonde tufts brushing restlessly against the curve of his ears. Has a new scar on his face, a long thin line that stretches from the edge of his jaw down his neck, untouched by whatever sun has warmed the rest of his skin to a gentle tan. He’s repaired the skin of his bionic hand with a bacta patch, the edges peeling a little with age, showing what look like scorch-marks underneath.

He’s arguably the most beautiful sight Han Solo has ever seen.

He tries to say something when Han gets within earshot of him, something about how he got word that Han was inbound for the Corellian system, coming to assist with some project or another, probably something important, but Han couldn’t care less if he tried and doesn’t even put forth _that_ effort, pulling Luke close and kissing him instead, the anxious knot that rises in his throat loosening immediately when Luke sighs and kisses him back. It’s been just over a month, less time than they’ve been apart before, but it feels longer now that it’s over, feels like Han’s aged a decade. He kisses Luke like he’s wanted to for all their time apart, rests his forehead against Luke’s when Luke pulls away from the kiss, breathing hard. Tastes the salt of the air, his fingers restless in the softness of Luke’s hair, his body warming where Luke’s hands rest on his waist.

“Missed you, kid,” he says, trying to sound gruff about it and failing completely, the kiss he presses to Luke’s forehead a sappy, sentimental gesture that makes Luke huff a quiet laugh, clearly pleased. “Where’ve you _been?”_

Luke twitches his shoulders in an uneven shrug. “Missions here and there for the Republic,” he says, simply. “Leia tells me you’ve been doing well.”

Jealousy burns up Han’s throat, fast and irrational, at the notion that Luke’s been in touch with Leia but not with him. He swallows it down, chiding himself for being childish. Leia is Luke’s commanding officer, not to mention the only living family he has left. It stands to reason that he’d be in communication with her, if no one else. To report and receive new orders, if nothing else.

“She contacted me when you left for Corellia,” Luke says, amusement lighting the bright blue of his eyes, and Han has missed them, missed _him,_ so much that he can’t even bother to be upset that Luke’s very likely snooping in his head again, listening without permission or warning. “We hadn’t spoken until then, really.” He squeezes Han’s side. “I think she’s worried about you.”

“Doesn’t need to be,” Han grumbles. “I’m fine.”

Luke looks at him without blinking for what feels like a very long time. “Maybe,” he says, “but ...” He cocks his head. “Leia’s not. You think I should be worried about her.” A beat. “Should I?”

“Losin’ your touch, Luke,” Han says. _“I’m_ worried about her, yeah, but you -- you’ve got other things to think about when you’re off doin’ stuff for the Republic. Leia’s all right. Just runnin’ a lot of things at once, and it’s tough, is all.”

Luke frowns at him as the memory of the TIE Fighters Han dragged aboard the _Falcon_ \-- bloodied and battered and fierce with just shreds of fight left in them -- flits across Han’s mind. Opens his mouth to say something and Han doesn’t want to hear it, doesn’t at _all_ want to hear it, so he leans down and covers Luke’s mouth with his own, the kiss cool with disinterest at first, warming slowly until Luke pushes him gently away, some of his old smuggler cool smoothing expression from his face, putting distance between them, even as they stand close, not quite embracing.

“Chewie with you?” he says, looking to the _Falcon._

“Yeah, of course,” Han says. “He’ll be glad to see you.”

“And I, him,” Luke says. He steps away, the simple gesture speaking volumes, but he slips his hand into Han’s as they walk to the gangplank together, gives it a squeeze before letting go, his body braced for impact as Chewbacca comes to greet them and sweeps Luke into the sort of embrace that would crush a lesser man. It gets a laugh from Luke, the sound warm and rich in the corridor of the _Falcon,_ only muffled a little in Chewbacca’s fur.

He sticks close for the afternoon, following Han to the base where he’s to be stationed, lingering while Han thinks out loud, looking over the briefing materials he read before launch then stalwartly ignored on the flight to Corellia. Offers insights into the situation, falling into the comfortable rhythm he and Han shared in their stolen months together, meeting each of Han’s ideas with careful consideration before offering an alternative, waiting through Han’s knee-jerk rejection for Han’s logical mind to catch up and catalogue the wisdom behind Luke’s suggestions.

“You’re pretty familiar with the lay of the land here,” Han says, when his eyes start to object to the glare of the holopad he’s been staring at, the duraplast chair he’s sitting in offering his back little relief when he leans back and looks at Luke, takes in the fall of his hair in his eyes, the understated power in his frame. “How long’ve you been planetside?”

“A few days before you arrived,” Luke says, setting aside the map he’d been studying and picking up his teacup instead, sipping at the tea Han’s certain has long gone cold. It doesn’t seem to bother him, his throat working as he swallows. “Your homeworld is beautiful.”

“Was,” Han corrects. “Imperials did a real number on her.”

“Nothing permanent,” Luke says.

And it’s a comfort to hear, releases a knot of tension Han hadn’t cared to notice, wound tight under his breastbone. Luke’s words are likely little more than unfounded platitude, intended to comfort, but there’s a certainty in his voice that even Han’s jaded suspicions can’t ignore, the bare thread of hope he’s held that Corellia would recover from the occupation hanging on, as stubborn and strong as any of the Corellians Han has known.

He tugs Luke into his bed that night when sleep starts to pull at him, his mind refusing to process the maps and data and mission briefs spread out before them, tangled in a controlled mess across the low table at the center of the room. He takes Luke into his body after what feels like hours of foreplay, touching and tasting and remembering, Luke’s hands tangled in his hair and breath coming harsh against his cheek, the younger man’s body shaking with the force of restraint that cracks as Han reaches his peak between them, making a mess of his chest and belly and hand, Luke crying out brokenly as he pushes forward, hard, Han watching him blearily as he shudders into a breathtaking orgasm of his own. He falls asleep with Luke’s body tucked against him, Luke’s kisses tracing lazy patterns on his shoulder. Wakes alone the following morning, his body sore and mind fuzzy, a sour mood descending on him at the sweetness of the memory of the night before, the dark pull of the work looming before him.

Luke is easy to find, at least, his black clothing stark against the light sand of the beach not far from the base, the white surf of crashing waves thundering before him. He’s folded up in the serene posture of meditation, straight-backed and still in the wind curling around him, mussing his hair, unmoving even as the surf reaches for him, the faint edges of the waves breaking against his folded legs, soaking his trousers.

“Tide’s comin’ in,” Han says by way of greeting, settling down on the hardpack sand beside him.

“It is.”

“You’re getting soaked.”

Luke opens his eyes, looks down at his own legs as if seeing them for the first time, at the seafoam bright and dirty on the black fabric of his trousers. Looks at Han, his affect of Jedi serenity tarnished by the hint of a smile trying to break through. “It’s fine,” he says. “I was planning to go for a swim after I’d finished my exercises anyway.”

“Uh- _huh.”_ Han points at the surf. “In _that.”_

“Yes?”

“I just said the tide’s coming in.”

“You did. And?”

“You’ll _drown,_ Luke.”

Luke rolls his eyes, a refreshingly human gesture that makes Han’s chest tighten. “I won’t,” he says. “I’m a decent swimmer.” He nudges Han’s knee with the back of his hand. He’s mended the bionic skin, the bacta patch gone. “I had a good teacher.”

“Nice try,” Han says.

Luke ignores him, rising gracefully from the wet sand just as a wave sends enough water forward to drag the ground out from under Han’s other hand, the tide gaining in on them as steadily as a lover’s persistent touch. Han pushes himself to his feet and follows Luke up the beach to the rocky dividing wall marking the edge of high tide, absently brushing wet sand from his trousers as he watches Luke undress, black fabric peeled away to reveal skin paler than Han remembers it being the last time he saw Luke stripped bare in full daylight, the scars wrapping around Luke’s body fainter than they were on Endor, purpling with age as they fade into his skin. He pulls at his own clothes when Luke bends to slide his trousers down his legs, tosses them in a careless heap next to the careful arrangement of Luke’s uniform, the wind pricking at his skin, informing him that it’s really too early in the season for a morning swim, the finger-light dread of the water’s chill settling in his spine like a memory.

He follows Luke back down to the fretful edge of the water anyway, welcomes the cold splash on his feet and legs, the unpredictable suddenness of the waves’ touch against him saving him the agonizing crawl towards inevitable discomfort. Watching Luke experience the Eastern Sea for the first time more than compensates for the aching chill, blue eyes going wide at the first crash of surf against his body, foam splashing up Luke’s neck, his shoulders going taut and abdomen clenching as the receding wave pulls at the sand under his feet, testing his balance.

“See?” Han says.

Luke gives him an unreadable look, then looks out across the water, at the waves coming in, all at once as steady and unreliable as a heartbeat. Tenses, when the next wave comes, and Han watches, seeing the inevitable as clearly as if he had Luke’s gift of the Force, ready to dive in and save Luke from his own stupidity when Luke pushes off and dives in, taking the wave on headfirst, his body swallowed in churning water and sand. He surfaces, spluttering as the wave recedes around him, manages a mouthful of air before the next wave finds him and pushes him under, coming in faster than the first wave. A surprise Han’s pleased to witness, even as he dives under and pushes himself towards Luke. Humanizing, not unlike the sight and sound of Luke in his bed, reaching greedily for touch and pleasure, giving as openly as he receives.

He finds Luke blindly in the tossing waves and pulls him further out to sea, ducking his head under the waves as they come at him and crash with muted force overhead. Beyond the breakers, he pulls Luke up and against him, treading water as the swell of the sea lifts and drops them, Luke breathing hard as he gains his bearings and looks around. At Han, at the waves crashing between himself and the shore.

“Trick to it,” Han says, when Luke sighs and pushes away under his own power, his frustration audible even over the murmur of the waves.

“I would have figured it out,” Luke says, humor warming his grumpy tone.

“‘Course you would’ve,” Han says. Memory surfaces of seeing Luke drowning in the lake on Roh'kna, struggling and scared and desperate in Han’s arms. Pulls at Han’s throat, his stomach squirming abysmally at the contrast between the Luke he knew in the past and the man he sees before him now, aged beyond the years they’ve passed together. “Saw you drowning once,” he says. “Don’t need to see that ever again.”

“You won’t,” Luke says, wiping water from his eyes. He considers Han, eyes bright in the glare of morning sun glinting off the surface of the water, silent for just a breath too long for comfort. “I don’t think I ever thanked you for saving me, back then,” he says, at length. “Or apologized for scaring you.”

He looks away when Han grumbles _yeah, well,_ across the stretch of the sea, stares at it with such intensity that Han looks over at it as well, squinting a little in the glare and seeing nothing that might hold Luke’s attention.

“I thought I was going to throw up when you pulled me up out of the water, that morning,” Luke says, saltwater brushing against his chin, his cheeks faintly flushed with the exertion of treading water in the choppy surf. “Same as when we made the jump to lightspeed the first time on the _Falcon._ You know I’d never left Tatooine before that, don’t you?”

Han nods. “You’ve said as much.”

“It was ... different,” Luke says slowly, “from how I thought it would be.”

“Well, we _were_ gettin’ shot at, right before we launched,” Han says. “Don’t think that’s how it goes for most folks.”

“Probably not,” Luke says. He shakes his head and ducks under the water, swims a few strokes. Pushes water from his eyes when he surfaces, his hair water-dark, plastered flat against his skull. Pulls himself along in a backstroke Han doesn’t remember teaching him, half-circling Han before ducking back under the water, staying under longer this time.. “I met you on the worst day of my life,” he says when he surfaces, closer than Han’s expecting him to be, the words coming out fast, as if he’s afraid he’ll lose his nerve to voice them. ”And it didn’t get better. I thought it would, I thought it _had_ to, but it didn’t.” He looks at Han, holds his gaze. “I don’t think it’s going to.”

“Luke, you --”

Luke waves it away, body language uncannily similar to his sister’s, covering just as little, just as much. “It’s all right,” he says. “I’ve had it easier than others.”

“Yeah, but --”

“Leia,” Luke says, before Han can finish. “She’s had it the worst, I think. She watched her home world destroyed. They tortured her while she was imprisoned on the _Death Star._ And Jabba --” He stops, spitting as water splashes into his mouth, a mimicry of the distant surf reaching for him in momentary impudence. “She doesn’t talk about it, but it was ... traumatic. And I didn’t save her from it. Couldn’t.”

“You did, actually.” Han argues. “I might not’ve been around to see it, but I _know_ you saved her.”

Luke shakes his head. “She saved herself,” he says. “I was there to save you, and she knew it. And I didn’t even do _that_ very well. You were -- six _months_ you were in carbon freeze, Han. If I’d gotten to Bespin faster, if I’d trained on Dagobah better, I could’ve --”

“What, been a god?” Han says, his voice sharp in the salt-heavy air, temper rising like the morning tide. “You’re human, Luke. Just like the rest of us, Jedi or not. And you were what, sixteen? Seventeen?”

“I was twenty-one,” Luke says.

“A kid,” Han says.

“That’s what Uncle Owen said,” Luke says, “the night before I left home. He said I couldn’t join the Academy because I was needed at home. I fought with him, and it was the last time I saw him alive. Or Aunt Beru. Just like old Ben, he died for me, and I didn’t get to say goodbye to him. Or Yoda. I was away for so long, he didn’t get to finish training me. He wanted to, and I just --”

He gestures with his hand. Han catches it, holds onto it as long as he can before concern for Luke’s ability to stay above the churning surface of the water compels him to let go.

“I’d never been free before,” Luke says, before Han can find words to comfort him. “Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru, then Ben and Leia and the Alliance. Yoda. The Republic. Vader. The Emperor. They all knew what they wanted me to do. _Told_ me what to do.”

He looks at Han, his gaze hard and penetrating, the pull at the back of Han’s mind unnerving, not the usual insinuation he can’t feel until Luke gives away that he’s listening. Memory surfaces, too clear and sudden to be his own doing: Luke standing in the shadows of a filthy spaceport, arms crossed over his chest, listening to a conversation between Han and the Rodian middleman they’d come to meet on one of their purchasing runs. The _Falcon_ jumping to lightspeed, the burn of liquor in Han’s throat as he pulled Luke close for a kiss right there in the cockpit, Chewbacca growling at them to get lost if they were going to do nothing but drink and grope each other while he was busy keeping the ship together. A long, wonderful night spent in a Sullustan hotel together, splurging the haul they’d taken on a big con, wrapped up in the feel of each other, drunk on sex and adrenaline and too much good wine.

“Until you,” Luke says, when Han blinks and the memories fade, the slate-grey of the sky taking its place, reflected in the surface of the sea, reflected in turn in the blue of Luke’s eyes. “I was free with you.”

He slips again under the surface of the water, sparing Han the struggle to find words to respond to him, pushes himself off with a sharp kick of his legs. Han swims after him, angling his body in the direction he saw Luke go, his heart pulling hard against his ribs, pounding with strain that has nothing to do with the pull and press of the waves around him. He sees Luke surface nearby, slightly west of Han’s trajectory, and watches as Luke pushes himself into another perfect backstroke straight away, strong pale arms pulling him towards the shore.

Han follows him, loses sight of him only once in the crashing surf. Sits beside him on the sand, watching the waves fret against the land, loud and powerful, the morning sun almost enough to warm his skin, gooseflesh rising under the drip and trickle of seawater tracing mindless patterns down his body. “Y’know, Luke,” he says, uncertainty flavoring each word in his mouth, “we could go back to it anytime. Back to what we were doin’ before. If you wanted to.” Images flashing through his mind as he speaks: Leia’s eyes dark with worry, lines forming around her mouth. Wedge with his squadron of children, brave and braced against the imagined horrors of war as they train. Lando, silent beside him, drinking to dull the edge of memories stacking higher every day, betrayal and redemption not yet reconciled. “You know me. Better at being a smuggler than a soldier. Always have been. I’d be glad for the excuse to go back.”

Luke looks at him sideways, head tipped back and mouth held in a firm line. Reading lies and worry from Han’s mind without bothering to pretend he isn’t. “We can’t,” he says, at length. Reaches down to wrap his hand around Han’s as he speaks, the sand coarse between them. Squeezes once. “Thank you for -- for trying, but we can’t. It’s all right. Really.”

It isn’t. Won’t ever be.

“Yeah,” Han says, looking away, across the pulse of the sea stretching out before them. “It is.”

 

 

 

 

Arguably my favorite chapter. This is the second-to-last one I have written. Luke’s side doesn’t go much further. Thoughts on that? Wrap it here or keep going? I can’t decide.


	12. Land

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The good news is: He doesn’t drown.
> 
> The bad news is: Han has to save him. _Again._

_Luke_

He tells Leia he’s going before he leaves, this time, even though she stood beside him during the briefing where he volunteered to go, knows already that he’s going, knows where he’s going, what he’s been tasked to do. Why he was the right choice for the mission; the only choice, really. They sit together in the relative privacy of what passes for an office in the compound reclaimed from an old Imperial stronghold, the private space with thick walls surrounding it a rare luxury afforded only to Leia and General Rieekan, Leia’s hair wound into a simple bun, her body folded in a mirror-copy of Luke’s favorite meditative pose, and Luke repeats to her the lessons given to him by Ben and Yoda.

Steady breathing. Focus. Reaching out. Feeling. Waiting. Patience. Focus.

“How do I know it’s real, not just my imagination?” Leia says, her brow wrinkled when Luke steals a look at her.

Patience. Focus. Trust.

“The Force surrounds us and binds us,” Luke tells her, reaching for her through the Force as he speaks, touching doubt and embarrassment and worry, thoughts like dust swirling underneath. “Even if it’s your imagination, it’s not entirely separate from the Force. Imagine it. Let it come to you how it will.”

Waiting. Trust. Focus.

“I can’t clear my mind. It keeps wandering. I’m thinking too much,” Leia says after a silent minute, her tone firm and decisive, a soldier reporting facts.

“Let each thought come,” Luke tells her. “Recognize it. Let it pass.”

Discipline. Feeling.

_Power._

Luke’s stomach twists. He draws a deep breath. Focuses.

Knowledge. Defense. Discipline.

He opens his eyes and finds Leia looking at him, mouth downturned in a frown. “It takes time and practice,” he says.

“You’re afraid of it,” she counters.

A shrug, trivializing the deep fear, cold in Luke’s belly. “I’ve seen what it can do.”

“What you could do with it. If you wanted to.”

“Yes.”

Leia hesitates “Luke, I don’t -- I don’t mean to tell you what to do,” she says, “but -- are you sure you want to take this assignment alone? Will it -- will _you_ \-- be okay?”

Memory comes across, sharp and hyper-realistic, taking advantage of Luke’s lowered defenses, his openness to his sister’s thoughts: Vader’s gloved hand outstretched, close enough that she could see the strain on the stitches binding the leather around his bionic hand. A press at the back of her mind bringing memories forward, eager and easy. Memories of family and growing up a princess, loved and groomed and doted on. Of Alderaan, beautiful and good and warm under bare feet and light clothing, her father’s hand around hers, swinging as they walked. Of darkness tainting warmth as the sound of the breeze became the rhythm of mechanized breathing, steady and even and hollow, blurring reminiscence like dark ink spilled across clean paper.

“Yes,” Luke says, pulling up his shields again, his heart pounding as Leia recedes, leaving him to his own thoughts once again, “I’m sure. I won’t do what he did, Leia. I won’t _ever_ do what he did.”

She looks at him for what feels like a very long time without answering. “Show me again,” she says when the words do come, closing her eyes. “I want to try it again.”

\---

She learns quickly.

Luke kisses her on the forehead before he goes, rests his cheek against her temple when she climbs to her feet and wraps him in a hug, gentle and distant.

\---

“That was very childish of you, you know,” he says, exhausting hours later when he finds Han asleep in the captain’s quarters on the _Falcon_ instead of the cramped room assigned him on base and aches with the thought of leaving him, leaving the life they’d stolen together for a precious few months. Guilt follows hot on the heels of his hesitance, duty firm like a stone in his stomach.

Han reaches for him and, on the third try, manages to get an arm around him, sleep making him clumsy and rough but defensive all the same, grinning like he’s gotten away with something when he wakes enough pull Luke close and open his eyes. One of them, at least. “Wha’?”

“Kissing me in front of Leia,” Luke says, giving in to the temptation to touch, feeling warmth and sweat as he brushes Han’s bangs back.

Han nuzzles into his touch, affectionate in the way he is only when drunk or sleepy or basking in the afterglow of orgasm, unguarded in the privacy of Luke’s presence. “She jealous?”

Temptation warms like laughter in Luke’s chest, the childish urge rising to the fore of his mind to share the memory of stolen images glimpsed as he showed his sister what he’s learnt about shielding the mind: Leia leaning against Lando’s side as they look together at a map, his touch hesitant as he slipped an arm around her shoulders, offering the comfort of closeness. Lando’s eyelashes dark against his cheek as he leaned in for a first kiss, careful and sweet and warm with surprise when Leia kissed him back. Lando’s skin, smooth and dark under her hands, which seemed so small and pale in contrast to his strength and surrender, but powerful enough to bring to them both a rush of pleasure and pain wrapped up in passion and secrecy, guilt faint and bare around the edges, like an afterthought.

“She already knew,” Luke says, pushing aside the temptation to treat the man drowsing against his hip to a taste of his own medicine, swallowing words he _knows_ would make Han more jealous than Leia ever could be. “I didn’t want her to have to see it, though. That I -- took you. Away from her.” The thought rides the heels of his words that Han could never be taken or given. Never be a thing to be _owned._ A flash of possessiveness, challenging the thought even before it’s passed.

He stretches out along the length of Han’s body, patient as he pushes Han’s arm out of the way, nudges Han’s thigh until Han lifts it, making room for Luke to curl around him, a familiar position refined through nights of practice, allowing them to sleep together on Han’s narrow bunk. Sleep pulls Han under again straight away, once Luke has settled comfortably against him, his breathing slow and even, mind a glittering silence of barely formed dreams, his heart beating steadily under Luke’s palm, marking the passage of time.

“I enjoyed it,” Luke whispers, kissing where his mouth can reach, tracing the line of Han’s collarbone. “Our time together.”

“Ain’t over yet,” Han murmurs, the words slurred with broken sleep. He tightens the grip of the arm wrapped around Luke and hauls him close, kisses him with absolutely no skill or finesse, until sleep returns and drags him under again, his body peaceful and relaxed.

Luke closes his eyes and settles in against him once again, but sleep doesn’t come, despite the hour, the pull of exhaustion strung along his arms and legs, knotted in his stomach. He matches the rhythm of Han’s breathing, walks through the mental exercises Ben taught him, the meditative mantras Yoda made him memorize. Imagines dragging the shape of numbers through the sand, a trick Aunt Beru taught him when he was little, barely old enough to know how to count and struggling against the pull of sleep, frightened by the imagined monsters in the dark corners of his bedroom.

He leaves when he reaches twenty, kissing Han’s slack lips once before he goes.

\---

He trains as he travels. As he works.

On his first stop, he makes a Twi’leki friend through little more than suggestion pushed at her mind when she sidles up to him with suggestions of her own, her presence at his side making it almost laughably simple to pull information from his contacts, to search them for knowledge of hidden agendas and alliances, to test their loyalties, their minds thrown into pliable distraction by the contrast of his companion’s pale blue skin against his dark clothing, her infatuation with him as delectable as it is false, dissipating like vapor before Artoo’s finished prepping his ship for departure once his work is done, information coded and communicated, back to Leia.

In the domed cities of his second stop, he stops a pickpocket with a thought and a flick of his hand, instinctively testing the would-be thief’s mind and finding it weak and open, child’s play, before his rational mind catches up, disgust and self-loathing rising in his throat as he blinks and looks down at the child before him, the boy leaving with enough credits to buy a square meal or placate mid-level crime boss and no memory of the man in black clothing who gave them to him. Simmering in an anger of self-loathing, he exercises less restraint with his contact, the warrior’s stubbornness grating to Luke’s sensibilities and possibly detrimental to the Republic, anger welling up in Luke’s gut at the slightest hint of resistance, darkened with pride and resentment. He pulls what he needs and leaves the man with a headache no painkiller could possibly touch, rewriting his reports several times over before encrypting them for Leia’s receipt.

He leaves navigation to Artoo after they’ve departed for his third destination, pushes his body into the stillness of meditation as they streak through the galaxy to the next spot on his maps. The success of the Republic is for naught if he follows in his father’s footsteps, he tells himself over and over until emotion bleeds from the words, leaving only the stark truth of them, his own life a blight on the lives of millions of others if he gives in to temptation. He repeats the words like a mantra, lowering himself back to the thin padding of his flight chair, the closeness of his X-wing around him, the Force shining like a scolding parent, bright in the darkest of his fantasies as he takes over control once again, leaving Artoo to blat at him indignantly over his comlink.

His third stop brings him his first sympathizer, then a second and a third, a cluster of friends who practice what they’ll say to him when he isn’t around, the rehearsed lines and contrived situations polished and organic, very convincing. Luke plays along, warms them to him. Loses a good percentage of the credits he earned during his time with Han gambling and drinking and sparring with them, their leader’s resistance to Luke’s touch against his mind diminishing as trust grows, all too easy to circumvent, his affect all too easy to influence. Their plans fall apart in a rush of violence and suspicion, Luke watching it from the shadows, leaving with only superficial damage to his person, and only when he’s certain his work is done.

He crafts his report from the relative safety of a Republic base on a neighboring world’s moon afterwards, lonely enough to contact Leia directly to deliver it, once it’s done, her image blurry in the holoprojection but achingly familiar, her smile when he says hello warming him like a shot of Han’s favorite bourbon, sending a shiver down his spine.

“You’ve been busy,” she says after she’s skimmed his report, lacing her fingers together and resting her chin atop them, her gaze searching, even over the parsecs separating them.

“There’s been quite a lot to do,” Luke says.

Leia sighs a laugh. “Isn’t that the truth!” she says. “I was raised for politics, but building a government from the ashes of war is more than my teachers imagined I’d be taking on.”

“Are you all right?” Luke asks. “Should I come back? I could --”

“I’m fine,” Leia interrupts with a wave of her hand, “and you’re needed elsewhere. Have you had a chance to read over your next assignment? It’s a bit more complex than the work you’ve been doing previously.”

Luke shakes his head. “Not yet,” he says, reaching for the datapad he’d been ignoring in favor of writing and re-writing his report, second-guessing his words as bitterly as the actions behind them. “Where --”

“Corellia,” Leia says, saving him the trouble of asking Artoo for a decoded version of the message waiting for him. “There’s little love for the Empire among the Corellians and quite a bit of skill honed in the Empire’s shadow. The Republic assisted in Corellia’s liberation, and many there are interested in assisting with the building of the Republic, now. It’s not an offer we’re interested in refusing, but we can’t risk that it’s a trap, either. Intentionally or otherwise.”

“Sympathizers,” Luke says, the word like a curse on his tongue.

Leia nods. “Yes. Unless you think it’s no longer a good idea for you to be the one --”

“No, it’s fine,” Luke says, perhaps a shade too quickly. He draws a steadying breath, blanks his mind like a hand smoothing ripples in a pool of water. “I’d be happy to.”

His sister considers him for an uncomfortable moment before dropping her gaze to the holopad in her hands. “Very well,” she says. “I have new orders for you, in that case. You’re needed at the base near the Eastern Sea on Corellia tomorrow. Can you make it?”

“I should be able to,” Luke says. “Is there an informant I should look for?”

“After a fashion,” Leia says. “I spoke with Commander Antilles a few days ago about your current initiatives. He shared the insight that Corellians are more likely to be forthcoming with information and loyalty if approached by one of their own, not just by you, though he said that your reputation will do you quite a few favors. Regardless, I’ve arranged for you to have local help with this assignment, as a result. He should be arriving a few days after you.”

“Wedge?” Luke says.

Leia gives him the sort of look that tells him his intelligence has come under immediate and serious scrutiny. “We’re not sending one of our best pilots and teachers to help you with recruiting efforts, Luke,” she says. “Commander Antilles has other responsibilities to attend to here.” She squares her shoulders. “It’s Han. And Chewbacca, of course.”

Luke stares at her. “Right,” he manages.

“He’s apprehensive about the state of affairs on his homeworld, and understandably so,” Leia continues, the face of his commanding officer replacing the condescending look of his sister in the blink of an eye, “so the arrangement will be mutually beneficial. You two work well together, after all.”

Luke catches himself laughing at the absurdity of it, the casual way she addresses the bantha in the room. Shakes his head when Leia asks him to share the joke. “It’s nothing,” he says. “Thanks, Leia.”

Leia dips her head in a single nod. “Take care of yourselves, Luke.”

“We will,” he promises. “Take care of yourself, too.”

\---

That night, he dreams.

His feet slip, bare against the coarse wet boards of the ship’s deck, sand and salt splashing his face with heat and cold when he turns to the massive shadow of a man standing just outside his field of vision. Darkness lashes against the bright linen sails stretched taught into the depth of the night sky, blinding him, his hand nothing but the metal endoskeleton anchored to his nerves and bones, doing little to block the onslaught of the whipping wind.

He isn’t surprised when the great Captain To’lorkin turns and considers him with his uncle’s face, lined from years of hot suns and dry air, eyes as piercing blue as the sky at mid-day. He leans close, wanting to hear the captain’s words, his uncle’s voice, but the wind pulls the sound away, greedy and vengeful, leaves him standing alone in the orange sands of Tatooine, clear water still around his ankles, stretching across the endless sand, a velvet blue sky seeping darkness into the bright light around him. Undaunted, he steps forward, the water body-temperature as it rises higher around his legs, the reflection of a full moon glinting off its surface, reflection of reflection, bright against the darkness. Up to his knees, he turns and falls backwards, slides without fear under the water, wanting to see the moon through the water’s unbelievable clarity, but when he tries to sit up again, to breathe the soft night air, the water moves with him, banding over his face like a living thing, suffocating him, drowning him, his eyes going wide as he gasps into nothingness --

He wakes to his shirt soaked in sweat, his heart racing. Sleep tempts him, but he resists, meditating until the line between conscious quiet and unconscious rest blurs and disappears entirely.

\---

Corellia is nothing like he’d expected it to be, pulling from memories of Han’s stories of home, shared in the quiet of long nights in interchangeable Echo bases, often under the influence of too little sleep and the constant undercurrent of fear, occasionally seasoned with the flavor of alcohol, hot on Han’s breath. The landscape is scraped across with the telltale signs of war, the wreckage of Republic and Imperial ships and weapons speckled amongst what Luke assumes to be home-grown Corellian defenses and artillery. The sea wraps around all of it like a clean sheet of durasteel, dark and restless against the land, the salt of it plain on the air Luke draws in on a long breath when he steps down from his ship, Artoo beeping curiously at him when he doesn’t move straight away. He gives the ‘droid a reassuring pat and reports to Base Commander Faradt, reaches out to test her mind out of habit or reflex or both, finds it strong, not readily yielding. She’s tired and her feet ache, weary under the pressure of welcoming the brother of royalty to her base in the midst of a tentative peace she doesn’t trust, even a little. He sees snippets of thought as she offers him tea: a child wanting to climb into her lap when all she wants is to sit and rest. A grandchild, maybe. A young man pulling the child away, apologizing for the noise. Calling her _mom_ as he does. Limping a little on a prosthetic leg not quite attached properly, the half-healed scars across his hands as he scoops up the child testament to violence not long past.

“I’m here to assist,” Luke reassures her, sipping his tea without tasting it. “We have no secondary agenda.”

“That you know of,” Commander Faradt says, her eyes sharp with distrust.

“That I know of,” Luke echoes.

It’s the right thing to say, Faradt’s suspicions quieter the next time Luke reaches for her, listening. She shares with him the reports they’ve compiled, names and background checks and old allegiances and accolades for bravery and honor, warnings and patterns and doubtful loyalties and old politics rising up to muddy the waters, age-old resentment just as bitter as suspected betrayal. He reads them carefully and asks questions sparingly, spends plenty of time alone with his thoughts, leaving Faradt to her duties while he waits for Han to join him.

He isn’t expecting Han to be happy to see him, the mid-day two nights following, prepares himself for Han’s grumpy complaints about Luke disappearing without saying goodbye, about Luke’s silence over the month he’s been away, dismissal and excuses both vying for preference as he weighs them, an endless waltz in the quiet of his mind. Excuses prove victorious for the five seconds he has before Han comes into his personal space and kisses him breathless, fear and anger and exhaustion radiating from him so strongly that Luke has to pull away just to _breathe,_ Han’s forehead warm against his own, Han’s hands strong where they hold him, anchoring him close.

“I missed you, kid,” Han says, moving to kiss Luke on the forehead, a condescending sort of gesture that Luke doesn’t dislike enough to do more than dismiss with a soft snort. “Where’ve you _been?”_

_You don’t want to know_ presents itself as a good answer, caught behind Luke’s teeth just in time for him to keep it unvoiced. “Missions here and there for the Republic,” he hears himself say, reaching by habit into Han’s thoughts, stopping himself when he realizes he’s doing it. “Leia tells me you’ve been doing well.”

Han tenses, almost imperceptibly, muscles going tight under Luke’s hands. Jealousy, Luke realizes, reaching again, seeing. Hurt. Resentment at the silence between them and no one else, Han’s perceptions selfish and skewed as always.

“She contacted me just before you left for Corellia,” he offers. “We hadn’t spoken until then, really.” _By choice,_ he doesn’t add, the dark energy of the Force difficult enough to hide in his reports. Likely impossible face-to-face, even with the distance afforded by holotechnology. He drags his thumb across the curve of Han’s lower ribs, muted through layers of clothing. “I think she was worried about you.”

Han dismisses the lie with a grumble, falling easily into the trap Luke set for him. Other worries surface in memory, as if called for: the lines around Leia’s eyes and mouth, speaking to sleepless nights and long days. Low-voiced conversations with soldiers Han doesn’t recognize that stop immediately when he comes into the room, secrets that surround Leia like the faint scent of her perfume.

“Doesn’t need to be,” Han says. “I’m fine.”

“Maybe,” Luke says, “but ... Leia isn’t. You think I should be worried about her. Should I?”

_Yes_ comes across so loudly that, for a second, Luke thinks Han’s said it aloud. He sees men in Imperial uniforms, bound and bloodied, stumbling disoriented through the corridors of a Republic stronghold, Leia standing like a beacon of death at the far end. Fear, like a bitterness on the back of Han’s tongue, at the memory of the same corridor, empty now, the doors marked INTERROGATION closed tight, no sound coming through. Leia passing him in silence, after, her eyes not quite meeting his.

Luke’s stomach rolls.

“Losin’ your touch, Luke,” he hears Han say, pulling him back to the salt-heavy breeze, the feel of Han’s warmth under his hands. _“I’m_ worried about her, yeah, but you -- you’ve got other things to think about when you’re off, doin’ stuff for the Republic.” He fakes a smile, the expression not reaching his eyes. “Leia’s all right. Just runnin’ a lot of things at once, and it’s tough, is all.”

The lie tastes like bile in Luke’s mouth, worse so when Han leans down and kisses away the objections rising without thought on Luke’s voice, affection and yearning and loneliness coloring his thoughts when Luke sighs and kisses him back, pushing him away before either of them has the chance to think too much.

He escorts Han to base, introduces him to Commander Faradt, to the officers on duty, enjoying more than he should Han’s discomfort at the starry-eyed look he receives from some of the younger Corellian officers, men and women who know Han only as the brave hero in the stories they’ve heard, not the self-reliant smuggler bastard Luke knows and loves. He shares some of Faradt’s insights with Han over a simple meal, shared in a meeting room. Quizzes Han over some of the more intricate details of their first assignment on Corellia, pleased and a little surprised when Han seems to know the material, keeping tight control of his temper when Han snaps at every suggestion he makes, defensive and protective in a knee-jerk sort of way, Han rubbing his eyes after he’s apologized the third time for being impatient.

“You’re pretty familiar with the lay of the land here,” he says, looking at Luke through the fringe of his bangs. “How long’ve you been planetside?”

“A few days before you arrived,” Luke says. He picks up his teacup and sips from it, focusing on Han’s mind, pushing as hard as he thinks he can without Han noticing. Sees exactly what he’s expecting: worry and hurt at the changes visible across the landscape as the _Falcon_ descended. Scars of war stretched across familiar land, the unknown reaching up like a hand, squeezing. “Your homeworld is beautiful.”

_“Was,”_ Han corrects, instantly. “Imperials did a real number on her.”

Luke shakes his head. “Nothing permanent,” he says.

He distracts himself with the list of contacts suspected to be Imperial sympathizers, verbalizing his plans for contacting and interviewing each, Han’s knowledge of Corellian culture helping immensely, both to refine Luke’s strategies and to lighten the mood, Han’s affectionate annoyance with the quirks of his fellow Corellians warm in the settling cool of early evening. It’s growing late when Han stretches, his back popping audibly, a testament to the hours they’ve spent working no different from the dry burn Luke feels when he blinks, his eyes objecting to the amount of reading he’s done, the low lighting in the room. 

“Dunno about you, but I could use a drink,” Han says around a yawn. “Been longer than I care to think about too much since I had some good homebrew. Nobody makes whiskey like Corellians, don’t let anyone tell you any different.”

Luke huffs a laugh. “I won’t,” he says. “You go on. I’ll finish up here.”

Han sighs, hard enough to constitute the equivalent of a full sentence. “No point drinking alone,” he says, “and you know what I want more’n a drink.” He leans back in his chair, considering Luke unblinking. “If you’re interested.”

Desire sparks in Luke’s belly, sudden and gleeful as though it’d been waiting to be noticed and called for, surfacing with ease of practice around Luke’s earlier thoughts of slipping down to the crash and rumble of the ocean, not far from base, his misplaced desire and pull tied to the still-fascinating rush of water in such large quantities.

“I am,” he says.

He lets Han drag him away from their work without any struggle, grateful to not have time to think too much, Han’s touch a welcome distraction, oddly foreign against his skin. He’s grateful for the dim light of Han’s quarters, the relative privacy afforded him as he settles on Han’s bunk, skin prickling, and pulls Han close, remembering him, the feel of Han’s nakedness pressed against his own strange in between the walls of Republic barracks, almost a taboo. He closes his eyes and does his best to lose himself in the urgency of lust, the focus of touching how Han likes to be touched, controlling his body’s responses as best he can when Han touches him back. He hesitates to move from the pleasure of feeling Han with his mouth and fingers when Han growls at him to do what they both want him to do, Luke’s entire body so powerfully aroused that he’s made a mess of both of them and the sheets twisting under Han’s body. Complies only when Han leans back and spreads himself open, so shameless in his wanting that Luke has to close his eyes and _breathe,_ just to keep his mind together.

It’s been months. Feels like longer.

He tangles his hands in Han’s hair and reaches into Han’s mind and presses his body deep into Han’s, feels the steady tension between desire and discomfort, arousal cooling from the breaking point just for a heartbeat before spiking as Luke pulls back and presses in again, everything slick and easy between them, Han’s body more than ready to accept Luke inside him. Desire thick with greed and lust and pure animal pleasure meets his next inward push, sending a shudder through his body, and he has to pull away from Han’s mind just to keep from being overwhelmed, his body tensing with the threat of climax, far too quickly. It’s all at once better and worse when Han groans broken encouragement into his mouth, pushing against the mattress beneath them in urgent counterpoint to Luke’s rhythm. Reaching between their bodies to stroke himself, his hand moving fast along his length when Luke leans back to make room, to watch, taking in the sight of Han, nude and flushed and open, reaching already for climax.

Han shouts when he orgasms, his back bowing off the bed, muscles clenching hard, stilling Luke inside him for the long moment of blanking gratification as his body jerks with the aftershocks, tense and electric. Luke rides it out with him, pushing himself in deep and staying there, ignoring his own body’s demands as he takes Han’s pleasure into himself, grabbing desperately at the memory of it, the sight and smell and feel more precious to him in that moment than anything else. He moves when Han exhales on a rush of breath, driven by the animal urgency of lust and desire, pooling hot at the base of his spine for just a precious few thrusts before exploding, his world reduced for one blissful, aching moment to nothing but tightness and warmth and _Han,_ wrapped close around his entire being. Sleep takes him quickly, after, his body curled comfortably around Han’s, nude beneath the sheets.

Exhausted, he doesn’t dream.

\---

The sea is nothing like he’d expected it to be when he slips from Han’s bed to visit it the following morning, only marginal wisps of duty and guilt brushing his consciousness as he walks silently past the work they abandoned the night before, out into the crisp air, laced noticeably with the scent of salt and peat, the smell stronger as he nears the beach, sand blown thick in the coarse grass under his boots. He strips out of his boots and socks, curls his toes in the sand, feeling the difference between it and the sands of Tatooine, of Roh'kna, of Endor. Walks down to the edge of the wetness in the sand, the morning breeze harsh and constant, tossing his hair into his eyes, a little less so when he sits, folding his legs and straightening his back, taking one very long, breathless look before closing his eyes and concentrating.

Ten contacts sit on the list of possible sympathizers, men and women all around Han’s age, long loyal to Corellia, serving the Empire on her behalf for her protection, sacrificing pride for her guaranteed survival. Liberated now, there are rumors about each of them, whispers. Suspicions of indoctrination, of unspoken alliance. Promises of power, wealth, leniency. All very persuasive, very realistic rewards from the staggering reach of the Galactic Empire.

Luke acknowledges the thoughts as they come. Allows them to go.

Han’s approach: Recruit all of them, bring them in close. Give them just enough rope to hang themselves, should they choose to jump. Be prepared to make examples of them. Show them to the worlds sympathetic to the Republic’s cause as traitors, welcomed into the ranks and ungrateful for it, betraying their countrymen as well as their cause.

Luke’s concern: Giving them access. Allowing the enemy in too close. The risk of loss of life, should ill intent be noticed too late. The damage that could be done, if one is more powerful than they estimate, than Luke estimates. The loss of credibility, should Corellia suffer for it, should any of their allies suffer from their error.

Han’s dismissive snort: _You’re too sharp for that, Luke. You’ll sniff ‘em out before they’ve even thought about doin’ something to hurt us._

Luke’s memory: Noticing ill intent. Allowing it to grow and manifest, curious to see where it might go.

Han’s ignorance: The damage Luke can’t be certain he hasn’t already caused.

He sits and lets the thoughts come and go, reaches into the deafening power of the water stretched out endlessly before him, feeling the Force, balancing it on the edge of his mind. _Balance,_ it whispers, almost audibly.

The solution: two sides coming together. Just out of reach when Luke looks for it, his breathing marking the minutes as they pass.

He’s made little progress when Han finds him, a distraction even before he’s within earshot, before he comes over to sit near enough for Luke to sense him as intimately as if they were wrapped up in one another still, nude in the rough cotton sheets of Han’s bed. More distracting even than the incoming tide, Luke’s legs telling him belatedly that he’s sitting on wet sand with wet trousers, Han laughing at him for it, for wanting to swim in the ocean while the tide’s coming in, swelling and breaking with unrestrained energy. As loud and brash as Han still laughing at him, insisting he’ll drown.

The good news is: He doesn’t drown.

The bad news is: Han has to save him. _Again._

“Trick to it,” Han says, his grin as bright as the morning sun glinting off the cold water. Happy in a way that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, the lines around them speaking volumes to experience, some of which Luke has known firsthand.

“I would’ve figured it out,” Luke reassures him.

“‘Course you would’a,” Han says. “But I saw you drowning once. Never need to see that again.” His smile falters, weakens; sunlight slipping behind clouds. Luke reaches out to him through the Force, sees the memory he’s expecting to see: himself, years younger, flailing in the still water of the lake on Roh’kna. Skin cool in Han’s arms, warming only as Han dragged him to safety. Han’s pulse racing, fear tight in his veins. All of the love and exasperation and protectiveness he didn’t show, not until much later.

“I never thanked you for saving me,” he says, softly, “or apologized for scaring you.”

He catches himself smiling at Han’s embarrassed _yeah, well._ Looks away from it, across the open water. Studies the horizon, a blurry line far, far in the distance. “I thought I was going to throw up when you pulled me up out of the water,” he says, half to himself, memory forming words on his lips as saltwater splashes them, tangy and sharp, embarrassment faded over time lifting like mist in his chest. “Same as when we made the jump to lightspeed the first time.” He looks at Han, takes in the familiarity of him, the slope of his eyes, stubble bristling on his chin. His brow furrowed, attention as focused on Luke’s words as it is during a firefight. Trying to see the connection, to anticipate the next move. “You know I’d never left Tatooine before that, don’t you?”

“You’ve said as much,” Han says.

Luke swallows. Salt burns his throat, a memory surfacing of Aunt Beru giving him saltwater to gargle after he’d lost one of his baby teeth, the clean drinking water she gave him afterwards to rinse his mouth sweet by comparison, the most delicious water he’d ever tasted. “It was ... different,” he says, looking across the water again, “from how I thought it would be.”

“Well, we _were_ gettin’ shot at, right before we launched,” Han says. “Don’t think that’s how it goes for most folks.”

Luke doesn’t tell him about his boyhood fantasies of escaping Tatooine almost exactly as he did on the _Falcon,_ running on a rush of adrenaline from blaster fire, leaping headlong into adventure and lawlessness and violence, coming out the victor every single time, no enemy strong enough to defeat him. Instead, he dives under the restless current, the press of silence as soothing around him as it was in the sweet freshwater of Roh'kna, Dagobah, Endor, Han’s presence like a bruise on the Force, steady as Luke swims, half-circling him. Han is watching him when he surfaces. Looks pleased when Luke swims close to him, their knees bumping underwater.

“I met you on the worst day of my life,” Luke tells him, watching his words pull Han’s face into a shallow frown. “And it didn’t get better. I thought it would, I thought it _had_ to, but it didn’t. I don’t think it’s going to.”

Pity paints an ugly picture on Han’s face. Luke shakes his head. “It’s all right. I’ve had it easier than others.”

Han opens his mouth to argue. Luke swallows a sigh.

“Leia,” he says, the single name enough to quiet whatever counterpoint Han might’ve been crafting. “She’s had it the worst, I think. She watched her homeworld destroyed. They tortured her while she was imprisoned on the _Death Star._ And Jabba --” He stops, memories shared with him rising up like nausea, a very real threat until he pulls control from the Force, disciplining his reactions. “She doesn’t talk about it,” he says, in case Han is foolish enough to ask, “but it was ... traumatic. And I didn’t save her from it.”

“You did, actually.”

A lie. They both know it. Luke shakes his head. “I was there to save _you.”_

Han argues with him. Luke wins. It doesn’t feel like a victory.

“I’d never been free before,” he says, like a confession, safe in the roar of the ocean, the stolen element surrounding him, supporting him, always ready to pull him under and keep him, to suffocate him. “Until you. I was free with you.”

\---

The temptation to run is stronger than any other he’s ever felt before when Han offers it, seductive words spoken in a thick haze of uncertainty and reluctance, lust and love and fear running like water underneath. Luke resists it, hides from it in the pull of the ocean, the wordless knowledge of water, deeper and more powerful than he could ever fear to be. Blanks it from his mind, pulling Han into his quarters back at the base, allowing lust and desire to cloud all else, to wear him down to the point he’s free from thinking, even if only for a bit.

Hazy and exhausted, he touches the pad of his thumb to Han’s temple, touches their foreheads together. Does his best to make sure that Han never offers him the temptation of freedom again.

 

 

 

 

This isn’t at all how I thought this story would end. A sequel might happen. Have to see what the muses say.


End file.
